Trigger
by Ad-Idem
Summary: AU. In the wake of losing their parents, Matthew and Alfred are given the opportunity to turn their lives around at an upstate New York school for boys. The secrets held within those walls, however, soon have their lives reeling toward tragedy.
1. Prologue: BANG

_Hey, there! My name is Right, and I'm one-half of this two person fan fiction account. My partner, Left, and I work on about 99% of our projects together, sharing writing fifty-fifty while doing so. We currently have numerous stories we're working with and swapping between the two of us that you can hopefully look forward to soon! Be that as it may, in my down-time I started writing this AU based upon one of my favorite movies, Sleepers (1996). While this AU is loosely (VERY loosely) based upon this movie/novel, it is not necessary for someone to be familiar with the material to follow this story. However, you should know that it is a very graphic story._

_So, here goes my first Hetalia fic! As well as Christening this account. _

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Rome, England, France, Germany, N. & S. Italy, Japan, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Seychelles, Sealand, Cuba, Prussia, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Vietnam, Greece, Vatican City, Austria, Hungary, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians  
**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Prologue: BANG

I am by no means a writer. What you are reading is no novel.

Who I am has mattered less and less over the years. I change my mind about that too much.

I am a what. And what I am is a brother.

And my twin . . . Well, I miss him very much.

* * *

It was the twenty-third of December. 1981.

We were in New York, my brother and me. He had wanted to spend Christmas at my place in Quebec. After all, it had been my turn to host our get-together.

I had insisted, though. I needed a break from my town, my home.

When I came to Hell's Kitchen, I was carrying my weight in mental baggage. As usual, my brother could sympathize. It was something he jokingly called a "family trait."

We attended mass at his favorite chapel. I restrained from asking how his praying had been recently.

Finished with our Catholic duties, I also brought up the proposal of drinking the night away. I never planned on getting drunk as a skunk, though I suspected he did, but I knew at least one drink could lighten things up. Our old neighborhood was not my favorite place to be but I dared to visit it both in the sake of nostalgia and for my brother.

I knew even as kids he would keep coming back to this place. It was part of his bones.

By the time we shuffled through newly crested snow and Alfred opened the door to what he bragged as being "the best bar on the corner" I sensed it was wrong. I knew it was wrong. But it was too late.

"They know my face around here," Al had continued his bragging as he closed the door behind us and brushed off his snow covered shoulders. His badge gleamed. "If I'm not a customer I . . . am . . ."

My brother's eyes were always an unmistakable, bright blue. The only exception to this was when he lost his face and became lost in someone I barely knew but had seen far too often.

His eyes dulled, simmering into a stormy gray mass as he stiffened his shoulders and stared at the bar. A patron already sat, but was alone, drinking some concoction that appeared to be whisky. I looked at him for only a second and I knew instantly who it was.

My heart raced and I glanced to my twin. I could not look at the man for any longer but Al just leaned back his head and looked down his nose at him.

He pointed with a shaking finger before grabbing my shoulder and drawing me close to his chest. I let out a small noise of protest but he ignored it. He was lost within himself.

"Do you see who that is?" he asked.

It was a dumb question. Of course I saw who that was. I sensed him from the moment we walked in and, suddenly, I was a twelve year old again, panicked and in pain.

My immediate offer was to go to another bar. I knew there were plenty to chose from, it was Hell's Kitchen. But Alfred was barely acknowledging my presence. His gray eyes were just swimming in madness as he finally released my arm.

"Don't," I pleaded in a hushed whisper.

He had already moved, though, making a bee line to the bar where the patron was answering the bartender's question.

"Al, _don't,"_ I begged.

Somehow I willed my legs to follow him and was soon standing only a few feet off from the man who smelled like coffee beans and bad liquor. My throat closed up on itself and I couldn't even manage to breathe as I stared at him. I was shaking.

Alfred plopped down onto the bar stool next to him, his maddened eyes sparking as he grinned a wild, crazed grin.

"How about you add a Sam Adams to that one," Alfred hissed. "His treat."

The bartender looked to Al with immediate recognition and shrugged at the request before turning around to fill it out. He probably took the moment as lighthearted joking between old friends.

I knew better.

The man turned and sneered at my brother, revealing his face to me for the first time. I began to feel faint.

It was him. Oh, God. Oh, _God. _

"Who the hell do you think you—"

Alfred slapped his badge down on the counter and looked forward at the bartender, as if more interested in watching his drink than looking at the man. The other was in complete silence as he looked utterly perplexed at the badge.

"What is this? You putting me under arrest?"

"No, not yet. I figure that the _least_ you owe me is a beer," my brother reasoned coldly. I had never heard him speak so . . . _calculating._ "In fact, you owe my brother a beer, too. Walter, could you add a second Sam to that?"

I could have killed him for bringing me into this, but when the man turned his face to see me behind them, I lost all my will power. I couldn't even think until his black eyes were away from me again. Then I could take a small breath.

Alfred was ready to meet his gaze by the time the bastard turned back toward him. My twin's eyes darkened even further and his sinister grin had molded itself into a definite frown.

"You're starting to remember us a little bit, right? Because we're the twins," he said lowly. "But that's probably all you remember about us. We're just more faces from your hay day, right? You sick fuck. You can't even remember all the little boys, can you?"

I nervously glanced to the bartender who had stopped and was finally looking toward the nearby phone. Would he be willing to call the police on a cop, though?

The man, however, seemed almost bored at the turn the talk had taken.

Al folded his hands together on his lap and leaned toward the man, showing off that he was much bigger than the child he was so many years ago.

"See, I think that's something you assholes didn't think through," Al continued, his voice barely over a whisper. It sounded wrong coming from him. My brother was loud to the point of being obnoxious by nature. "You played your fucked up little games with dozens of little boys, so many you can't remember them. You never thought about how we'd _never_ forget you."

The man stared but was otherwise blank. I could see Al wince and I knew it was working his limited patience.

"I remember everything," he added quickly.

My eyes wondered to my brother's hands and I could see that they had separated. I could also see one sneaking behind his navy coat, fingering the weapon holstered there.

Then my heart began to pound.

"Al," I spoke up, foolishly attempting to bring my brother back into reality.

"I remember everything you did, Magear Tweed," Al continued, his voice and body becoming more rattled with every breath. "I remember everything you did to me, my brother, and my friends. That's why I'm taking you in, you sick little fuck. I'm taking you in before you can touch another boy."

He withdrew his handcuffs and I felt my heart leap again.

My head was spinning and I was filled to the brim with an incomparable pride when I heard – nay, _felt _– a click in the air.

"Little shit," I heard that terrible voice speak up. "I'm not going anywhere, especially not with some faggot who moaned for his brother every night."

For a faint moment, I swore the earth stopped. I watched as my brother's eyes became a childish blue again, wide in shock.

There was a blast.

Then, as soon as it began, it was over.

* * *

_Okay, so that was my first try at this, and the first story uploaded to our account. Please Review! I'd appreciate it more than you know!_

_~Right_


	2. Chapter One: Early Tragedies

_Thank you SO much for those reviews! I was seriously so flattered by them all. I cannot thank you all enough! These next few chapters may appear a little slow after the Prologue, but it will pick up its pace, I promise.  
_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Rome, England, France, Germany, N. & S. Italy, Japan, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Seychelles, Sealand, Cuba, Prussia, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Vietnam, Greece, Vatican City, Austria, Hungary, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
Mr. Vargas = Ancient Rome_

**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter One: Early Tragedies

The system had always been broken.

That was something that Officer Michael Jones used to say to us, his two little boys, before he went to work. He never lied to us about the injustices we would face because someone leaked through a crack or disappeared when his probation officer looked the other way.

He did tell us, though, that a hero should stand up when something was wrong. That a hero wouldn't be afraid to do what was justice.

Al really took everything he said to heart. Dad was his hero and, for a while, he was mine, too.

I was always more observant than my twin, though. Even as children, the world I saw was not through the same rose-colored glasses. I knew that for all the over-time that Dad put in, mom still couldn't go to the grocery store enough.

I also knew that in the months leading up to that April in 1963, Dad wasn't happy. In fact, he was damn near catatonic.

When I was older and curious, I would look up reasons for why he hadn't been happy. From the best I can speculate, it had to do with a gambling addiction, too many nasty hangovers, and a felon by the name of Alfeo Esposito.

Alfeo Esposito had been incarcerated due to drug trafficking charges a year before and was released the August of 1961, when my brother and I started school in P.S. 102. Officer Michael Jones was his probation officer, placed in charge of a man who, despite reputation, had been cleared.

I remember that month very clearly because we were given two responsibilities: one, to be sure to tell people we were from _Clinton, _not the street's more notorious name and, two, to look out for one another.

I also remember that month because a boy three grades older than us was sold heroine and died on the playground. The man proven to have sold the drugs was one Alfeo Esposito.

* * *

By the start of the 1963 spring semester, Alfred had decided that he didn't necessarily enjoy going to school. Not on days he could be playing in snowball fights.

At that age I was more inclined to disagree with him and convince him to do what Mom and Dad told us to do, namely stay in school.

Looking back, the amazing thing isn't so much that I was willing to talk back to my brother as it was that he actually listened.

In those days, we were never more equal. Everything that the Jones Twins did was arrived at by mutual consensus or, in the very least, a compromise.

The start of the spring semester also brought us to realize that our father was at the house more often than our mother suddenly. I know now that he was on suspension. And binges.

We were five years old the April when our mother came to school early and met us in the principal's office.

She had spared us the horrific discovery of going home after school that day and finding what was left of our father's brains sprayed across our living room. She had discovered it for herself on her lunch break that day.

The day before she had gone to the market and bought everything needed for beef stew. Dad's favorite.

We ended up throwing those away after the closed-casket service.

All I really remember about this, the first of our lives' tragedies, was that there was not a single moment when Alfred's wailing could not be heard. The priest, Father Antonio, had stopped every few minutes it seemed to wait for my brother's voice to die down before he continued his slew of Latin.

I don't really remember my reactions at the funeral itself.

I know that I would later be angry and spiteful of what my father did. I blamed him enough to change my name to Williams, our mother's maiden name, when we were eighteen. It was something that brought up quite the fight between Al and myself.

The only other thing I can attribute directly to this event was that we never got to taste our mother's beef stew again. That was a shame, because it was Al's favorite, too.

* * *

Until 1966, things played out in a small, quaint harmony.

The position of being decent kids on a less than decent Manhattan street seemed to play itself out for us more than anything else. We had our friends and we had our enemies but, at the end of the day, nothing seemed to matter too much so long as your legs could carry you away from the scene of a crime when needed.

There was a small group of us who followed around the older, almost teenage boys. We thought we were cool little punks.

I still fondly remember the summer that Al thought he was a hotshot because he stole some of Mom's cooking oil to slick back his hair like a true greaser. Then there was when I tried to prove myself to our 'gang' leader that I was willing to distract the corner store clerk while the older kids stuffed their shirts with whatever they found valuable.

Both incidents ended with our consciences getting the best of us and confessing to our Mother who, nine times out of ten, punished us accordingly.

The problem was that we were never in any one group on the street for long. There was always _something _worth shunning before we were too involved. Usually it was Al discovering that some older kids were involved with drugs.

I was always amazed that Al could sniff it out before I could. Secretly, I think it was because he was always looking for it. Dad always gave us signs.

Red eyes and noses without a cold usually were a tip off. Strangled, dead hair; yellow nails and teeth. There were the infamous twitches, too. At nine years old, my brother could tell the difference in every kind of spaced out twitch. I was always aware enough to look out for myself, but Al seemed to be hunting it.

"Drugs killed Dad," Alfred always said when he was reasoning with me why not to go down a street.

In Al's warped sense of reality, I suppose he was sort of correct.

As much as he looked for it, it still surprises me that Al never noticed Mom. I don't think he wanted to. I know I didn't. Yet I had known for years and years it seemed.

I have the feeling that if I would ask Al later in life if he knew, deep down, that she was on drugs, he'd have to say yes, too.

* * *

The date was July 26, 1966.

My brother and I had not been nine years old for even a month yet when, on that hot Saturday, Mom told us we should go to mass and confessional. She did that from time to time, just on a whim.

It was when she wanted to be in the house alone and hadn't the patience to argue over the phone with her mother-in-law about taking us off her hands.

But I was okay with it. I liked the chapel near our home and Father Antonio had been with Al and me almost our entire lives. We were boys in his parish and, after our commencement, he had taken us and a few others under his wing. It was a really special feeling, to be loved like that and have someone to look up to.

Al and I sat in our usual back row pew. I sat and listened with quiet reverence to everything Father Antonio said, even if my understanding of the dead language was more than a little lacking.

Alfred jittered around for a half hour like he had a bug in his shorts.

When the service was over, I made my way to the confessionals only to watch my brother split.

"I just want to go home," he said with no further explanation.

I was sort of tired of putting up with him so I merely waved him away with a casual stroke of my hand and he left. It wasn't a long walk, at least. And, as we had gotten older, it had been more ordinary for at least one of us to leave the other for the simple fact that we could.

* * *

To say I was away from my brother for any more than thirty minutes would be a gross over estimate. Fate had it that every other sinner on the street decided to show up that Saturday, too. There were a lot of things to confess on those hollow streets, and I was one of the last people in the church.

When I had finally made my way back home, I almost immediately got that sinking feeling in my gut that something was wrong.

Something was _terribly_ wrong.

As I approached the shady front of our apartment complex and saw two familiar police cars and an ambulance parked in the street, their lights whirling but sirens suspiciously off, I began to panic. I ran through the gathering crowds and took off up the familiar stairs of the building.

I still remember my heart racing, my brain thumping in my own skull with scenario after scenario.

When I reached the fifth floor and saw that our door was open and two of Dad's old friends from the department were standing in the living room, my legs began to wobble and I grew lightheaded.

Shakily, I managed to get to the door before the two looked at me. For the life of me I can't remember their names anymore.

"Easy, son," one said lowly to me before strolling over and gently placing a rough hand on my shoulder.

I wasn't interested in what he had to say at the time. I was attempting to put all the puzzle pieces together on my own when I glanced over to the couch and saw my twin sitting there, his chin resting on his chest. He looked so surreal, as calm and quiet as he _should_ have been in mass only half an hour before.

"Al?" I heard myself whimper, though it certainly didn't feel like I had said it.

"Mom's dead, Mattie," he said flatly, like all the emotion had been drained from his voice. He didn't even give me the decency of looking at me as he broke the shocking news.

There was a few seemingly endless moments where all I did was stare at my brother and question how he could speak so unloving of the only parent we had left. Here he was, the boy who cried for a month straight over our father, breaking the news to me about our mother without so much as a tear.

I was angry, but not as much as I was anguished.

I remember dropping to the floor and erupting in cries that I feared would never end.

* * *

Now that I'm trained in the field, I can have a little bit more sympathy for my brother's reactions. I suppose one could say I understand more of how he turned out to be Al.

My brother found our mother dead in our bathroom when he came home from mass early, but not early enough. She had a troublesome cocaine addiction that had gotten the best of her that day.

She died with her head submerged in the toilet.

What we inherited for all our young lives' troubles was what little in the house our mother hadn't torn apart in a drug-induced fever and twenty dollars which had been all the money we were supposed to live on that week. It still seems rather cruel and unfair but, in the very least, she had done her best and successfully paid off our father's gambling debts before relinquishing her own life.

I still hold to the idea that, if she hadn't done at least that, I would have blamed her for everything that happened to us after that point almost as much as Alfred did.

Still, even if it had been under better circumstances, I believe the terrible transition of going from our shabby but livable two bedroom apartment to sharing our paternal grandma's couch would have been just as hard as it was regardless.

* * *

If anything made me second guess my decision to change my name from "Jones" to "Williams" it was Grandma Jonesie.

To this day I, like my brother, love that woman with every fiber of my being. She had nothing when she took us in and yet gave us the world through her funny Irish blabbering and gentle smile.

I also suspect I would have appreciated her food more if we had been in a better position to have food to cook with.

Still, in whatever way she was able to get by, that precious woman took the two of us in when we had nowhere else in the world to go. She kept us in line and, perhaps showing where Dad got his values of justice, put us to bed with words like "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled" and "There's neither success nor efficiency without authority and laws."

Sometimes I find myself amazed that my brother never donned a mask and cape when I look back at everything.

The only real vices our Grandma Jonesie had was an affinity for whisky, which Al found hilarious, and the fact that about three months after our big move, I realized half our furniture was gone.

"Grandma Jonesie!" I gasped as we entered the home, Al rushing toward the living room couch we slept on until he realized that there was no longer a television in front of it. "Where's all our furniture?"

"Help me with the groceries, Matthew," she responded without a second mention of it. "We're making a pie tonight."

* * *

Al found it harder to skip services after we moved in with Grandma Jonesie.

She lived only a block or so away from our old apartment, so I was fortunately able to convince her to go to the 'Damned Italian' oratory so that I could keep in contact with Father Antonio. Unfortunately, at least for my brother, she was very much unlike our mother in the fact that she actually went with us.

Opposite of our mother, the death of our father actually had Grandma Jonesie going to church _more. _

At the end of the service we walked together, Grandma Jonesie taking one of or both of our hands to keep herself upright, would walk us home and we'd share a lunch or dinner of crackers and cheese with shot glasses of water.

When it was getting dark and Al and I came back inside to escape the frightful night life of Hell's Kitchen, we crawled onto the stiff couch, my head on one armrest and his on the other.

We would stare at each other and talk sometimes, mostly over who was taking the most of our blanket. Other times we'd just stare.

I hated when we didn't talk, though. It was always when our stomachs were the loudest.

* * *

Children are resilient things. We were able to keep in check most of the bubbling emotions that rippled through us after our mother's death.

It also helps being a twin. I never had to tell Al anything about my reasoning when he'd find me in the bathroom or out on the fire escape a sobbing mess. Like I did for him after Dad's suicide, Al would just be there and hold me when I most needed the feeling that there was still a family for me.

Still, as a child I knew I had to tell _someone _about the guilt that was crushing us.

Alfred might have been unobservant, but he was never outright stupid. It just took him a bit longer to realize that perhaps the TV was sold because there was no point in having a television when you can't pay the cable bills or that perhaps the only reason we got seconds with our cheese and crackers was because Grandma Jonesie wasn't eating any for herself.

That, more than anything, was eating us alive.

I could barely sleep at night with the combinations of hunger pains and nagging guilt that we were somehow, ultimately, responsible for Grandma Jonesie's own life being uprooted.

It's heavy stuff to take on when you're only then beginning to look forward to being double digits.

At the end of our fourth grade year at P.S. 102, I decided to make a trip to the chapel which both frustrated and confused Al. He wasn't allowed to come home without me and was therefore forced to come along.

He waited at our pew while I went to confessional.

"Forgive me father, I have sinned," I muttered almost before I could shut the door.

"Easy, child," a familiar voice said in utter gentleness. "Sit and talk."

I had been Catholic my entire life. I was familiar with the drill, but there was a nagging feeling that this wasn't the sort of confession I was supposed to be professing while in there. Still, anything to ease the guilty, restless nights was worth trying.

I sat.

"Because of me and—" I paused and recalled that, just maybe, God would appreciate if I let Al talk out his own sins. "Well, because of me, Grandma is broke. I'm afraid we're going to be evicted and it's all because she's too busy trying to take care of us instead of paying the bills. We didn't mean to do this to her, but now we are and I'm scared. I don't want to lose everything!"

My words fumbled each other in my mouth and even though I caught myself returning to plurals, it was much easier than trying to force the words anymore than they already were.

The priest was silent for a moment before releasing a steady breath.

"Ah, _mis muchachitos pobres," _he sighed. "Is _su hermano_ here?"

My cheeks became very warm. "Father Antonio, you're not supposed to know who I am."

"Today is different, _mis dos pequeños,"_ he said gently. I listened to his clothes rustle as he moved within his sectional. "Get your brother and meet me in my office. We need to talk."

I sighed and agreed before heading out to get Alfred.

When I look back, I realize that had this day not come about, had I not gone to Father Antonio that day we might have lost Grandma Jonesie either due to the state of New York or another tragedy.

I also realize that this was what my brother and I could consider our first steps into Hell.

* * *

[Notes]  
*Clinton - more popularly known as Hell's Kitchen. A neighborhood in the Manhattan suburb of New York City, running from 8th Avenue to the Hudson River. It is infamous in popular media for a bad atmosphere. It served as a bastion for working-class Irish Americans  
*'Signs' - these are very vague tip offs for substance abusers, I'm aware, but keep in mind this was the 1960's and while Narcotics Forces were not non-existent, the understanding of the drug world was superficial at best. After all, there was a time when EVERYTHING was just called "dope.  
*Grandma Jonesie's quotes - "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled" is from Matthew 5:6 (coincidence? I think not!). "There's neither success nor efficiency without authority and laws" is an old, Irish saying. No pressure, kids.  
*Pie - if you're that curious, I imagined it was a nice Irish Apple Pie.  
*Catholicism - I will be the first to tell you that, in spite of having the majority of my family from a Roman Catholic background, I was not raised in the church. I have investigated it numerous times as well as lived for the past 12 years of my life with a Roman Catholic grandmother, but my understanding isn't perfect. Feel free to call me out on anything that is wrong enough to bother you. I will try my best to correct it for the future.  
*"mis muchachitos pobres" - Spanish. "My poor little boys"  
*"su hermano" - Spanish. "Your brother"  
*"mis dos pequeños" - Spanish. "My little twins"

_Thank you for reading. Please tell me if you think I'm not handling the translations correctly or if they're interfering with anyone's ability to read the chapter! _

_Please Review  
~Right_


	3. Chapter Two: The Last Summer

_You guys really are just too nice to me. Thank you very much for your kind reviews! I'm sorry if updates are a little slow, but I'm working with my friend (Left) to get our first combined fic out and on the run, and it's the main concern in my free time writing. I do have the next chapter already written and am waiting to have a little more of Chapter Four fleshed out before I post it. Hopefully it won't be too long.  
_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Rome, England, France, Germany, N. & S. Italy, Japan, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Seychelles, Sealand, Cuba, Prussia, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Vietnam, Greece, Vatican City, Austria, Hungary, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
Mr. Vargas = Ancient Rome_

**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Two: The Last Summer

Al accused me of getting him in trouble no less than ten times on the short walk to Father Antonio's office.

I was so sick of having to defend myself to him that I had somehow lost my initial nervousness over the meeting with our mentor. Or, at least, I had until we were at the office door.

Alfred was still muttering rather loudly to me as my breath hitched. I could see Father Antonio again and my young, naïve shame was careening back and flushing my face.

Antonio was an olive skinned young man, having only served in the clergy for a few short years before christening my twin and myself. To us, however, he was much older with wisdom and power far surpassing our juvenile comprehension.

When we walked into his office we found Father Antonio hanging his service robes. He was not dressed nicely but in appropriate street clothes. Were it not for the collar no one would have fingered him out as a priest.

"Heading out, Father?" Al asked hopefully.

"With you, _mis dos pequeños,"_ he responded before taking his hands and gently touching our shoulders. "Would you like some burgers and shakes?"

An excited squeal came from Al's throat.

I didn't make a sound, but I could not blink away my hot tears.

* * *

Junk food never had the appeal or hold on me that it did my twin. Now I hardly touch the stuff.

I can tell you with no shame, though, that the burgers we had that day with Father Antonio were the greatest meals we ever had.

Bar none.

* * *

After being uncharacteristically quiet throughout our meal, Father Antonio lit a cigarette and took a huff.

The motion was simple enough but it drew Al and me from looking at our plates. The curiosity returned to our features and we waited expectantly for more reason for our mentor to call us out to the diner with him.

"You are such good boys, you know this?" he questioned with a gentle sadness in his eyes. He looked at us and waited before continuing. "So easy would it be for you two to be angry, violent."

In the chair beside me, Alfred's breath hitched some and he squirmed before looking away from Father. His face was as red as the cherry on his half-devoured shake and I felt a wave of compassion for my sibling.

"I'm not that good," Al muttered. "I don't even like going to mass. That's all because of Mattie."

This made me blush and I grabbed his hand. He didn't resist.

"You are good boys," Antonio continued with a gentle sureness in his voice. "The call of _el Dios_ shall come to you in time, when He needs you, _Alfredo._And you, too, _Mateo._ But I want to talk about what _Dios _is telling me to do now."

The two of us glanced to each other before looking back to Antonio.

Still sitting on the bar stool of the diner, he folded his hands together on his lap and leaned forward. It was as if he was about to impart upon us some secret, some greater knowledge from God himself.

It made my breathing pause as I restrained any noise or movement which might distract me. Al was doing much of the same.

_"Mis pequeños,_ if I asked you to dress up in your nicest clothes this coming Wednesday and bring _su abuela_ with you to the church, would you be able to do it?"

My twin and I looked skeptically to one another before looking back to Antonio. It was a simple enough question and, no, we would not have anything to do the Wednesday after school let out because who really wants to sit at home all day and watch each other starve to death?

"These are as nice as my clothes get," Al said.

I rolled my eyes. He had a suit just like I did. It was too small, but we wore them every now and then for Grandma Jonesie. He could manage to wear it at least one more time for this.

"I think you look handsome, _brilliante,"_ Antonio responded with a small smile. He clapped his hands on our shoulders and I could not help but smile under that look of his. "I know God intends for you to do something," he said softly. "I know he does because he tells my bones."

"He should try telling your head," Al responded cheekily.

* * *

My first impression of Mr. Vargas is among those images I can only hope to remember until the day I die.

The Wednesday following our diner dinner with Father Antonio had come sooner than either of us could anticipate. We suddenly found ourselves sitting patiently on stools within the back of the church. The two of us could only tug uncomfortably at the too-short sleeves of our suits and hope that we were not too obvious in our eavesdropping.

Grandma Jonesie sat in a green dress with nothing elaborate or memorable about it. Yet, I can still picture her perfectly as she sat there, tired and wrinkled in that dress. Her hands played with the twenty year old purse in her lap the entire time.

It felt like we had been waiting only forever for that show to get on the road when, finally, Father Antonio walked in from an opposite door. He was leading two other men.

The first was a short fellow, old and withered. I had seen him before and knew that he was the bishop who had been to our particular chapel more than a few times. He seemed as though he would be nice enough, but he also seemed like he was bothered.

I got the feeling that it had something to do with us.

The second man was a tall man. A very tall man. Probably among the tallest I had ever seen.

In the corner of my eye I could see my brother's eyes bulge as he caught sight of the olive skinned individual who seemed to almost gracefully _glide _himself across the floor and toward us. He seemed older than Antonio, and he was unshaven with a mess of curls sticking every which way on his head.

He turned and grinned at us. He had the strangest, golden eyes I had ever seen. So full of joy and wisdom yet a pain. Some empathetic connection he portrayed just by locking eyes with us.

"Oh, good," he said. "These are the boys!"

His every word came out happy and joyful. It brought a smile to my face and a blush to my brother's cheeks, although, for the life of us, we had no idea what there was to get so giddy about.

Grandma Jonesie shifted uncomfortably in her chair and shot her sharp, blue eyes at the man. Leave it to our grandma to be completely unmoved by the unique spirit of this individual.

"These are _my _boys," she said with her brisk, angered tone. "And if anything's to be involving them, by the Son, the Father, and the Holy Spirit, it had best involve me as well."

Antonio suddenly got a very nervous twitch as the bishop turned and stared harshly at our poor family. He pulled at his collar before waving his hands.

"Everything involves you, Ms. Jones, I assure you!" he said quickly, his own words betraying his attempts to hide nervousness. "You just have to be patient."

Al and I looked at each other and frowned. It was never a good idea to tell Grandma Jonesie what to do if, for no other reason, because that would make her inclined to do the exact opposite.

"Father Carriedo!" she called out his name like an Irish curse. "I have been very patient with you and this church, but I do not take lightly to being drug out here on a Wednesday so that I could watch my grandsons be graded like meat!"

Al's stomach released an unyielding growl and I groaned. Why did she have to mention meat?

"I knew this was not going to work, Antonio," the bishop said sourly.

"Ms. Jones," the priest began to beg only to be hushed by a throaty laugh from the tall man.

"No, no, let us not get upset~" the man said as he held out a hand to Grandma Jonesie. He was nearly bowing toward her. "I am Mr. Roma Vargas. I am the Head Master at _Saint Francis deSales Academy, _and I was interested in giving your boys a scholarship to our school."

I felt it.

That thump in your heart when everything in the world seems to stop and you realize that, for the first time, something good has come your way. I had no idea what we were getting into and yet it was just so exciting. So _right._

Grandma Jonesie, whose face was flushed from the strangely mesmerizing man, suddenly began to scowl. It was not a regular scowl, though I knew what it was.

It was her defensive look for when she did not know what was going on. She wore it a lot when Al would tell stories from the school playground and she could have _sworn _that he was insulting her in some way because of how fast he talked.

Seeing he was not about to receive her hand, Mr. Vargas straightened and looked at her with a gentle grin. "Have you never heard of our facilities before?" he questioned. "It's not too surprising, we are new. Very young."

She stared at him intently. Al and I looked to each other nervously.

"Never 'eard it," she grumbled, her speech becoming slurred as though she'd hit the taps.

"Ah, Ms. Jones," Father Antonio spoke up, inching his way toward our grandmother. "The school is one of our dioceses most ambitious projects. It is a large, private campus in upstate New York that has fantastic teachers, education opportunities, and a chance for boys like _Mate_—Matthew and Alfred to have a Christian education directly from the church."

Al let out an irritated noise. He was not expecting this to be a school-thing.

Grandma Jonesie bristled and glared at him. "How are the boys supposed to have classes everyday? We have no car. It's too far away."

"We own much land around the Academy, _signora," _Mr. Vargas said. It was astounding how persuasive he sounded without even trying to persuade a point. "On the campus we have dormitory facilities where the students stay. It is like one big, happy _famiglia!"_

I looked to Al who looked back. We seemed to share each other's concerns.

"They play, eat, live, and learn together," the bishop spoke up, sounding rather proud of the situation himself. "They learn the value of the word of God, the fine arts, histories, maths and sciences, and even some work ethic."

To all of this, Mr. Vargas nodded idly, as if he had suddenly lost interest again. His golden eyes shifted to the banister and he began to admire the architecture of the building.

This made Al snort. I'd say he did so quietly, but that would be physically impossible.

Shifting in her chair, Grandma Jonesie first gave us a warning glare, shutting us up, before turning back to the three men. Her lips pursed and she shoved her hands as deep into her old purse as they could go without tearing the seams.

"I could never afford such a thing," she said quickly. Her eyes then set themselves on Antonio. "And you! Shame on you, Father Carriedo. You know better."

"You're forgetting the scholarship, _querida mujer!"_ Father Antonio did his best to defend himself.

"What's a scholarship?"

I sighed. I knew it had been too long since the last time Alfred had an outburst. At least this time around he was asking something that I shared some interest in.

Mr. Vargas chuckled, though. "Smart man, asking questions is how you learn," the sage-like headmaster stated before rubbing his stubbly chin. "Scholarships are like _rewards, tesoro._ They are given to boys who work hard and want to be where _Dio_ needs them be but need help with the money."

Money.

I became even more entranced. We needed money. Even Alfred and Grandma Jonesie stiffened at the mention of monetary supplement.

"Our school is special," Mr. Vargas continued. "We are run by the _Archdiocese_ so they pay for most of our costs. The rest of the costs come from our many, many opportunities for the children to work. We have a large farm where the students can learn and work. And they take up jobs to clean and cook and other various things. It is part of their scholarship, they work and can eat, learn, and live at our school for _free."_

Alfred and I nearly choked on our gasps at the same time and glanced to one another. I could feel my own eyes about to pop out of my head. We couldn't believe our ears. God had answered our prayers!

"When things are too good to be true," Grandma Jonesie spoke up, "don't believe them."

My shoulders slumped as I felt myself deflate.

"It _is _true, _Señora_, I give you my word," Antonio spoke up, seemingly on mine and Alfred's behalves. "The boys need this. You need this. It is the right thing to do. The opportunity is here."

I was sold, as was Alfred. Our fingers laced as we joined the three men in staring expectantly at Grandma Jonesie for an answer.

* * *

My fingers curled into Grandma Jonesie's palm as gently as possible. I studied her face and had to second guess the feelings that were bubbling within my own stomach.

This woman had given us so much and I could not swallow the feeling that, in spite of myself, I should try to share more of her perspective on our predicament.

As usual, Alfred was beside himself.

"Did you hear everything Father Antonio said?" he squealed. "There's a farm! With horses and cows and crops that we'll work on. And it's close to the Lakes! We're going to be in classes with all kinds of other kids who won't say anything about where we live. Oh, and sports! Mattie, we can play basketball! Or, oh, Mattie! Let's play some football!"

I frowned.

More than anything I wanted to share his enthusiasm about the good news, but my attention was still focused on poor Grandma Jonesie. Her face was hardened beyond all emotions.

"It sounds great, Al," I whispered under a breath.

And it really, truly did.

However, Grandma Jonesie cursed under her breath, earning a grin from Alfred. "Do not make yourself so excited," she nearly snapped as we turned toward the front of our apartment building. "We have to go with Father Carriedo to _see_ this place first!"

My twin and I glanced at each other before dropping the subject.

* * *

A week or so had passed us by before we were able to ride in a rental car with Father Antonio.

The drive felt like it took forever, the majority of our time was spent being lost as Grandma Jonesie scolded the poor priest for his poor sense of direction. He apologized numerous times and reminded us all that since moving to America he had spent little, if any, time outside of the city.

I was not sure how to feel as the jungle of walls and streets disappeared behind us and left us prey to an open, wider world. It looked so surreal.

"You remember Old McDonald?" Al had asked me as we stared out our respective windows. "I wonder if he lived somewhere like here."

"Children, we've not even left the suburbs," Grandma Jonesie had responded.

By the time we reached Jefferson County, the roads had become dusty and bumpy. Father Antonio laughed at our confusion and began to tell us stories of his childhood in Spain, how these roads were nothing compared to them. Alfred argued that point, citing that nothing could be worse than feeling every pot hole laid out before us.

For a while, I concurred, but something was tense, and I didn't _really _have to ask what it was.

It was Grandma Jonesie.

Once we had left the suburbs she had closed up into herself and would not speak again until we reached the city. My brother and I, unusually attuned with our guardian, could not figure out why she was so emotional over this school.

* * *

The school was strange in construction to say the least. A former monastery, the campus was divided into many sections in the middle of a long patch of land and farm.

At the heart of the institute was a large, beautiful brick cathedral which had stained glass and beautiful, sweeping buttresses at every corner. The grounds were all interconnected by strange, winding crosswalks that at any time collided and intersected with one another.

Two huge, three story halls sat right alongside the Cathedral and directly across from what was explained to us to be the teachers' offices and apartments. These were the Boarding Halls, or dormitories. The East was known as Lamar and the West was known as Bonnefoy.

"Why two?" Al asked.

"For the boys school and the girls school," the stuffy shirted man showing us around had answered. "While the two are funded individually and treated differently, they are both controlled by this parish, and, when you're older, you'll share some classes with the Lamar girls."

"I don't want classes with girls," Al hissed.

To this Father Antonio laughed and patted our heads. "We'll see how long that lasts you, _mis hijos."_

There were several class buildings that were all connected but considered different halls. There was Baird Music Hall, Counter Hall for English and Literature, Kertcher Hall, Banner Hall, and so on. It was all very daunting and confusing.

We were assured, however, that we would get the hang of it once we began walking to classes everyday.

That was, _if_ Grandma Jonesie agreed to let us go.

Still, she had not said a word.

* * *

We should have been happy as we sat in Mr. Vargas' office and watched Grandma Jonesie sign the papers.

She did not even look our way, though, and to Al and myself that was unnerving. She was all we had outside of each other.

* * *

It was decided that Al and I would move into our four-person dorm room along with our two new roommates the last week of August.

This actually excited Al quite a bit because it meant that we would be starting school later than we would have if we returned to P.S. 102.

When we laid down to go to bed on the couch every night, we would stare at each other and in humble voices speculate on what our lives were soon to be like. Everything was good but, then again, we could not imagine things being any worse than they already had been.

Our gang back in Hell's Kitchen didn't sound concerned or impressed.

"You'll be back home before a week's done," seemed to be the general consensus.

They should have known better than to say something like that to us, though. Alfred took it as a direct challenge to his character. Those were the sorts of drives that kept and would continue to keep my brother doing anything presented to him.

Father Antonio took us shopping during July, though we refused at first.

"Nonsense," he said. "You will look like the two young men I know you are when you arrive at the academy. You will blow them away, _mis dos pequeños!"_

It seemed like the only time we weren't obsessing over the new life in store for us was when we were in Grandma Jonesie's apartment. It was already the beginning of August and she had not mentioned the first thing about it to us.

This made us nervous and, at least for me, a little sad.

I was beginning to worry about leaving her.

* * *

A week and a half before our departure and we had been exhausted from a particularly long, hot August day playing tag throughout the neighborhood.

By nine o'clock, my brother and I were sprawled out on our respective sides of the couch, the covers kicked off and the window beside us wide open to allow a breeze.

It seemed as though I had just closed my eyes when I woke to the sound of a chair scooting across the floor.

Curiously, I opened my eyes and turned my head to face Grandma Jonesie as she scooted the old kitchen chair from the kitchenette to the living room couch and sat in it.

Confused, I reached over and nudged Alfred's shoulders to wake him up. He kicked me in response. I smacked his hand.

Groaning, Al sat up and rubbed his eyes tiredly before looking over and seeing our grandmother. He jumped with a start and muttered "Jesus" under his breath, earning a nice smack over the head from Grandma Jonesie.

"Your mouth, Alfred," she reminded him.

Al and I looked to one another and then back to her. This was more than unusual behavior for her as Grandma Jonesie was notorious for being dead to the world between the hours of eight o'clock at night and four o'clock in the morning.

She was staring at us carefully, looking older than I ever remember her looking. When no one had said a word for what felt like an eternity, she looked to her lap.

It was the firs time I noticed that a cloth was wrapped and folded neatly on her knee.

"I want you boys to always remember who you are," she said gently before unfolding the cloth. "If I'm not there to tell you, then tell each other. Tell yourselves."

Neither of us dared so much as to breathe as she unveiled that within the cloth resided a coin. A very special, familiar coin.

She palmed it, massaging its tarnished silver with her wrinkled fingers.

"This is Saint Michael," she said gently. "He watched over your father." I listened as Al released a small, indescribable noise. "I know it's not much, boys, but it's all I have of my son except for you two."

I stared at her and felt my stomach sink. She said all this with so little emotion that it was almost hard to understand the pain behind her eyes.

"Keep him between the two of you," she ordered before reaching out and placing it in Al's already waiting hands. She looked at me. "Matthew, keep your brother out of trouble. Don't let him make of fool of himself in classes."

My throat felt try. "I will."

She glanced to Alfred who was all but absorbed in the coin. "Alfred," he looked up, "don't let anyone pick on Matthew. Never leave him behind. Try to remember to talk to God, it's a _Catholic_ school."

"Yes, ma'am," he whimpered weakly.

"'Tis all I ask of you boys," she said thickly before holding out her arms. "Give me a hug. Both of you."

We dove into her arms almost immediately. Secretly, I wished she would just hold us there forever and never let us go again.

* * *

The night before we were to meet Father Antonio at the chapel at six in the morning, Alfred and I sat together on the window sill.

Grandma Jonesie hated when we did that, and would always box us on the ears and drag us inside, telling us we were reckless or trying to give her a heart attack.

That night she did nothing about it.

Al was holding Dad's coin. I had a glass of water.

"I think this is the last we'll be hungry, Mattie," he whispered, cautious of Grandma Jonesie's presence for once. "It's the last night we'll be worried about that stuff."

"Maybe," I responded. My eyes searched the familiar city. I was noticing things about our street that had seemed so small and unremarkable before. "Are you scared?"

"Never."

I frowned, hoping to myself that he was lying. If he wasn't then he was making me feel like a bit of a wimp.

And I was tired of being the 'wimp' just because I did not share his excitability and energy.

"This is the last time it's going to feel this way," I added.

"What way?"

I frowned and shrugged to myself. "I don't know. I just know that it's going to be the last time it feels this way."

Looking back, I don't think he knew what I meant. Soon, however, he would have to learn.

* * *

[Notes]  
*The translations in this one are either the same from the previous chapter or simple enough that I figured it'd be best not to list them. If you really want them, though, just tell me and I'll revise this section.  
*St. Francis deSales (1567 – 1622) Patron Saint of Education  
*St. Michael – archangel and Patron Saint of Police Officers

_Again, I would REALLY appreciate your feedback on this one. I know some of the reading get a bit tedious, and I apologize._

_So, please review!_

_~Right  
_


	4. Chapter Three: On the First Day

_Okay, so after this chapter I'm going to try to make my updates more consistent. I was thinking about twice a week (if I keep this writing spree up. And one day that you can just about count on me updating on is Friday, for convenience sake. I would really like to shout out to _**semetastic **_and_ **AngelKitty501** _for their reviews last chapter. If it's okay with everyone I think I'll do shout-outs from now on ;)_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Rome, England, France, Germany, N. & S. Italy, Japan, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Seychelles, Sealand, Cuba, Prussia, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Vietnam, Greece, Vatican City, Austria, Hungary, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians**  
Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Three: On the First Day

The morning was hot. Our nice, newly purchased shirts were already clinging to the smalls of our wet backs before we ever pulled off of Clinton.

I watched the familiarity disappear as we turned the corner and waved one last good bye to both the unusually quiet neighborhood as well as the only family member we had left in the world.

Grandma Jonesie had told us flatly that if we asked her to drive to St. Francis with us she would box us in the ears.

"Our little school boys, _si?" _Father Antonio said over his shoulder to us, a strange pride swelling in his throat.

Al responded with something but I was beyond listening to him listing the things he was going to do at the school. I had heard enough of that list two weeks prior, not that this would ever stop him from delivering it with the same fervor over and over and over again.

Instead, I watched the unfolding streets before us and realized that, inspite of living in it my whole life, I knew so very little about New York City. It seemed as though our entire lives had always revolved around the apartments we lived in on Hell's Kitchen.

How were we supposed to know that the world was so much larger?

That there were things that were so much worse?

* * *

Something was different about St. Francis deSales Academy on our second trek to its unusual campus.

It was better.

During the early summer day when we visited the campus was quiet, filled only with the sounds of occasional church bells and the visage of teachers, priests, and nuns who were carrying on with their own business. It was quaint and beautiful.

On the day we moved in, the campus was _alive_ and _vibrant. _

From the time the rental car stopped until we drug our small and mostly empty suitcase to the third floor of Bonnefoy, we were enveloped in the excitement of dozens of our future peers.

We ducked around older boys as they stopped in the hallways and reconnected after a long summer of being apart.

Nervous and excited, we watched them. We wanted more than anything to _be _them.

Father Antonio had to usher us into our room to finally meet the two boys we would be staying the rest of the school year with.

* * *

Toris and Eduard , our roommates, had already moved their things into the room by the time Father Antonio had managed to drag Alfred and myself away from gapping at the older boys.

Unlike meeting Mr. Vargas, these were not among our greatest first impressions.

As soon as we entered the door, Al crinkled his nose and looked at the other two. "Why is all your stuff in the middle of the room?"

"Al," I sighed quietly from his side.

"Be nice and introduce yourselves," Antonio chided as he smiled softly, took our bag, and began to make his way toward the other boys. "Hello, I'm Father Antonio Carriedo. I brought the Jones boys."

"I'm Alfred F. Jones," my brother caught up almost immediately.

"What's the 'F'?" asked the blond with glasses.

"Fitzgerald. It's like the old president, but on accident," Al explained away his most frequently asked follow-up question. He suddenly grabbed me by my shoulder and tugged me close. "This is my brother, Mattie."

"Matthew," I reminded him.

The blond who spoke up before fidgeted with his glasses and smiled kindly at us. "My name is Eduard von Bock," he explained. "I started here last year with Toris." He nodded to the nervous boy beside him with long brown locks. "Last year we only had three of us in the room. I'm glad it's actually full this time. It's strange when you have empty space.

Toris still hadn't said anything.

"What happened to your third roommate?" asked Antonio as he inspected the room.

"He didn't come back this year," Eduard responded lowly.

Antonio began to mutter as he tested the sturdiness of the first bunk bed. It was something about the room not being as nice as the one they showed us on the visiting day.

I wanted to ask about why anyone would leave a school like this when, as usual, I was interrupted.

"So why _is _your stuff stacked in the middle?" Al pressed the issue.

"We wanted you two to pick your beds," Toris spoke up for the first time. His voice was strangely strained.

"First pick? Really?" Al grew a grin and immediately ran to the one near the window, scurrying up the ladder to the top bunk like a monkey.

I followed him, stopping at the edge of the bottom bunk and staring at it in wonder.

The next thing I felt was Father Antonio's hand on my shoulder and I looked up to him. He smiled gently at me and shrugged. "You look confused, _mi hijo."_

Shaking my head, I responded. "No. I'm … I've never had a bed to myself before."

Said bed rattled as Alfred tossed from side to side, testing out the most comfortable mattress we had ever slept on. He looked like a nesting weasel.

Father Antonio's mouth was slightly open as he stared at me with an unreadable expression. He then recalled his place in the world and looked back up to Alfred. "No jumping on the bed, _Alfredo, _you'll break it!"

* * *

"So you're twins?"

It had taken until dinner that night before Toris had worked up the courage to talk to us again.

Al and I had stuck to the two second-year students like glue throughout the first day, letting them show us the bathrooms and the ins and outs of the first floor cafeteria.

We were eating like mad. After all, it had been the first cooked meal we had had since the good father had taken us shopping nearly a month beforehand.

"Yes," I said as I finally swallowed my potatoes and swatted Al's hand away from my grape juice.

"You can have my roll if you want it," Eduard said as he eyed Al curiously.

"Wow, really? Thanks!"

Toris chewed on his lip as Al consumed Eduard's (hopefully) unwanted leftovers. He then spoke again. "So you're like … identical."

We got that a lot.

"No," Al responded before I could, wiping his mouth on his shirt sleeve. "My eyes are blue. And his are like … purple."

"They're blue, just … a different shade," I said defensively. Saying you had a color like _purple _on your attire, let alone as an _eye _color was granting permission for your ass to be handed to you on our street.

"Like purple," Al said with a shrug. "And Mattie's hair is almost red. Like Dad's was."

"Just a _little," _I retorted, giving my brother a stern look. I knew the term 'strawberry blond' but, again, where I came from that was asking for you to get beat up. "And it's more like Grandma Jonesie's red."

The less like our father I was the better.

By the time our slight bickering was over, we noticed our two roommates were staring at us intently. They were picking us apart, comparing our every feature to see the supposed differences we had listed.

"Alfred's hair is a little curlier, too," Eduard finally surmised … while he was staring at me.

I cleared my throat. "Actually, I'm Matthew."

"It's something you'll get used to," Al assured them. "Everyone does."

* * *

Each hall had an older boy, a high school aged boy, and he was the Hall Brother. He was supposed to be sort of our Resident Advisor, the go-to student for any of our living or school needs.

They had to be doing well academically, active in school and church work, and they were never a single hour behind on their weekly work duties.

From the moment I learned of that position I had set my goals to do it.

Al knew I was going to do it before I had even made the plan.

"You'll be a great Hall Brother someday," Al said, his eyes gleaming, full of dreams. "We can do it together. Hall Brother Brothers."

"You'll have to do good in school," I reminded him. Grandma Jonesie's words were still rattling at my heart.

"You'll have to do some sports," Al added pointedly.

* * *

That first night we all sat in a circle on the hall. None of us were younger than eight or older than twelve. We were a small group, only a fourth of the large third floor dorm, but to myself and Al it felt like we were swallowed in a sea of our peers.

We liked it a lot.

Our Hall Brother was a decent enough looking fellow. His hair was a bit long, as seemed to be the fashion at the school, and it was such a bright blond that it made Al's hair look like honey. The boy's eyes were large but set in a constant scowl and at any minute there was a chance he could attack.

"My name is Vash Zwingli," he informed us in a barking tone that reminded me of Dad's loud police colleagues.

It made me jump. It made Al smile.

"I am your Hall Brother," the boy continued. "I am here to help you and be your friend, _if you need one." _He added the last part with a warning gaze sweeping across us and the other boys. "I can help you with homework, but I will not do it for you. On my door I have two sign up sheets.

"One sheet is to sign up for your work hours. Every student has at least eight work hours a week they must work for the school. You cannot do less unless you are sick or not staying here that week. But then you must make the hours up.

"The second sheet is to sign when you are going into town. You must have an older student with you. You must sign out before you leave and sign back in as soon as you come back. If I find you on campus talking to your friends when you're signed out, you're in detention. If you're out in town when you're not signed out, you are in detention. Three detentions this way and you go to Headmaster Vargas. If it continues you can be expelled."

I had the feeling that if more kids knew what 'expulsion' meant, they'd join the few that had gasped.

Vash stared at us again before waving his hand. "I will be doing a bed-check at ten. You all must be in your rooms and have the lights off by then."

He turned and went to his own room.

* * *

"He's like a total party pooper," smiled the boy from the other hall Al and I met during our adventuring. "I had him as Hall Brother last year."

I frowned at Feliks. Al stared at his hair.

"Does no one get a haircut around here?" Al questioned.

"I, like, totally don't waste my time in town, like, getting haircuts," Feliks responded. "Plus, like, it's a waste of money. If it, like, gets too long I'll like totally get Gilbert to like cut it or something."

I inquired about this Gilbert.

"He's like only the best Hall Brother like ever," Feliks explained. "He like gets in trouble like a _lot_ but like everyone likes him. So it's okay."

Al was having a hard time getting over Feliks' inflections, I could tell. Dad had hardwired us to avoid certain speech patterns that were the 'marks of lowlifes.'

"Feliks," I spoke up, looking to the side now that our trembling roommates were out of earshot. "Why doesn't anyone stay on our hall?"

To this the boy made a face. "Like, I totally don't know. Like, I left because of Vash. He and I like don't get along at all. Maybe, like, everyone else had like the same problem?"

I nodded. It made since.

"People just don't like when others enforce rules," Alfred repeated something I also had printed on my heart. He rubbed the coin in his pocket.

Feliks rolled his eyes. "You'll like totally get along with like the guards."

I frowned and cocked my head to the side. "Guards?"

"Like security," he explained. "They like patrol campus. Kinda like grounds keepers. There's like four of them. They patrol like the halls at night to like keep out people from the streets."

"Hobos?"

Feliks shrugged at Al. "Maybe."

My ears felt a little cleared up after hearing a sentence without _like._

* * *

"Like _totally," _Al snorted before spitting out his toothpaste.

"It's not nice to make fun of people, Al," I reminded him before taking some water in my mouth to gargle.

I spit and then tightly closed my eyes as my stomach rolled over itself again.

"Maybe I ate too much," I groaned. I felt like I was going to explode.

This made my brother scowl. He grabbed my shirt and lifted it up. He looked angrily at the tiny frame, at my jutting ribs and swollen stomach.

"No," he said before patting my rib cage. "You didn't eat enough."

In his eyes, I could tell he meant it.

"What the hell are you two doing?"

Al lowered my shirt and looked over his shoulder. I moved to the left to get a better look at the man standing in the doorway.

He was wearing black and blue, a small badge on his chest. He was a rather swollen up man, not too old or too young but still had the girth of an old glutton. It looked strange, like a skinny man who had been pumped up with air of a balloon.

Still, much like my brother, I saw that badge and felt relieved.

It was okay that the guard had sworn at us. Dad and his police buddies swore all the time.

A few Hail, Mary's would take care of it.

"Checking out our muscles!" my brother responded eagerly.

The man looked us over and laughed. "Muscles?" he questioned. We nodded. "Mind if I see?"

Al and I looked at each other for a moment before shrugging. The guard had a nice laugh that rolled over his crooked teeth like a warm bath. It was a harmless laugh and he had some twinkle in his eye that made you just say "Okay."

We lifted up our shirts and the man looked over us.

Without another word, he left.

"I guess he wasn't impressed," Al said with a shrug before putting his shirt back on and grabbing his toothbrush from the corner of the sink.

* * *

I sank into my cushion that night. It's the sort of thing you would never notice unless you had spent so much time either on a couch or on a stiff as a board bed entangled with your sibling.

The moon was full and I could look straight out the window from my bed.

This was what I had been looking forward to all along without ever realizing it. My own bed. My own start. With my brother and yet arm's length apart.

I groaned as I felt Alfred plop into bed beside me.

"Couldn't go to sleep?" I mumbled.

"No," he whispered before crawling under the covers with me. He never asked for permission but, in a strange way, I welcomed it.

After all, a bed had never been my bed before it was his too.

"Scared?"

"It's dark up there," he muttered.

"Wimp."

He shoved me into the wall and I glared at him.

"I just want to see the moon," he whispered, finally mindful of our roommates only six or so feet away. "I can't see it from my bunk."

"Do you want to switch bunks?" I mumbled tiredly.

"No," he yawned before wrapping an arm around me. "Heroes never sleep on bottom."

I tucked his head under my chin and closed my eyes.

That was how we fell asleep our first night.

* * *

_Not much in the name of Notes to list today, though I would like to better explain why I'm writing this fic. _

_This is not what you would call a 'concentration' of mine, as I'm much more concerned with my co-written works with the other writer on this shared account, but I don't let that keep me from taking this subject seriously. _

_Child abuse is a terrible, awful issue that angers and saddens me when I reflect on it. It is unfortunate that it still exists and it is even more unfortunate that its trials and punishments are taken so lightly. By making it a Hetalia fic I'm venting some of the frustrations I have on the subject and, maybe, hopefully, inspire one of my fellow fans to also take a stand. _

_I am also sorry for the shortness of this chapter. I'll try to make up for it in the future._

_~Right_


	5. Chapter Four: First Love

_Oh, wow! I can't thank you all enough for really supporting this story! It's really encouraged me to stick with it despite so many other things going on right now. Really! To answer some questions asked about last chapter: no, this isn't twin-cest, although the closeness of Alfred and Matthew's relationship does become important in later chapters. As for other pairings, there are maybe one or two that are right-out stated in this fic but it's not a pairing based story so feel free to tinker with your views as you like ;)_

_Shout outs to _**FluffDucklings**_, _**Semetastic**_, and _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_ for their supportive reviews! And thanks to all the other readers for keeping up with this story!_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Prussia, Estonia, Lithuania, Hungary, China, OC!Mexico, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians  
_Mr. Beilschmidt = Germania  
Mr. Reyes = OC!Mexico_

**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, "Light My Fire" © The Doors, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Four: First Love

The first week we were at the school there were no classes. The week was like an introduction and it started with easing students, particularly first time students like Alfred and myself, into our work schedules.

That was one of the principles they were always sure to press with us: work ethic.

It was easy enough for my brother and I to accept, it was pretty much what Grandma Jonesie and our mother had always expected from us. We would have never thought that such small tasks like laundry or mopping and sweeping could cause such fuss.

"How can you like stand to do like that stuff?" Feliks once asked when we accepted the job of scrubbing the bathroom floor. "It's like totally disgusting."

Alfred mumbled to himself so I answered out loud.

"It's only dirty until someone cleans it," I said with a shrug.

And it was true. It wouldn't take us long to clean the bathroom floors. Not to mention, we had stayed in plenty of apartments beforehand which had floors _much_ worse than the ones found in St. Francis deSales.

Still, many people were beginning to marvel at just how many of these chores Alfred and I were already capable of doing.

"I guess this is why they make such a big fuss out of work ethic," Al reasoned on the third night. "Did you notice that people don't hardly sign up for laundry? There's all kinds of slots open for it."

I had noticed. I found it strange, too, because while it did seem girly to us, Al and I had always been responsible for at least our own laundry.

After Dad's suicide we were responsible for many things when Mom could pull as many as three shifts a night at her various occupations. Laundry had been one of the easiest things for us to do. There really wasn't anything to it, especially if there were laundry machines.

"Have you ever done the laundry job?" I asked Eduard one morning as we were all getting ready to go to breakfast.

"No," he stated flatly. "Everyone says not to do it. Toris used to but he stopped before the end of the week."

I caught the smirk on Alfred's face and rolled my eyes. He smelt a challenge and, as usual, I could almost place money on the idea that he was going to drag me into it.

We had filled up our schedules that week, though. Al had wanted to spend more time on the farm, learning how to use the equipment and be around the animals. I had a strange sensation that we were going to give that up in about a week, too. Everyone said the farm work was the hardest.

* * *

The first Monday for classes had come before the Tuesday that Al and I were supposed to start at the farm. I remember it clearly because on our block schedules, we had art, gym, Latin, and math the day before the farm.

Miss Elizabeta Hedervary was a beautiful young woman that I immediately developed my first crush on.

I loved everything about her from her long brown hair to the flower tucked neatly behind her ear, to the fact that she could wear quaint, lovely dresses like a respectable Catholic school teacher one day and "out of fashion" Go-go boots the next.

She was as eccentric as any art teacher could get and it only added to the fact that every little boy that took her class fell head over heels for her. Except Alfred, but he's an exception to most things. He was more excited about the farm.

"I want you to draw anything that comes to mind," Miss Hedervary said in her cooing, soft voice. "Anything at all, it will give me some insight to you."

There was only one thing on my mind at the moment, and I immediately reached for the brown crayon to draw Miss Hedervary's hair.

Al grabbed it first.

_"Al," _I complained as he began to sketch on his paper with it.

"I want a chocolate cow," he explained before looking at his paper. "You can have the crayon after me."

Then he did exactly what I feared he would do and brought the end of the crayon up to his mouth to chew on. That used to piss me off so much when we were kids. He had to chew on anything he was writing with. We could never keep pens around for long because of it.

I snapped at him, which he ignored, and reached over to find a less perfect shade of brown. Instead I found orange and decided I really should try to start with that punctual flower over her ear anyway.

I began to delicately rub the wax crayon over the surface of the paper, attempting to do the flower from my committed memory. I was smart enough to know it would be embarrassing if the teacher caught me gazing at her for long periods of time, after all.

I then grabbed the peach colored crayon to draw in Miss Hedervary's pretty, even toned skin. This led to me completely ignoring Al's tossed, wet crayon that he attempted to give me.

He continued with his barely recognizable creation and I rolled my eyes at how easily satisfied he was with it when I felt someone lean in over my shoulder.

"Are you the Jones twins?" our teacher asked us gently as she eased her thin hands onto mine and Al's shoulders.

I felt my tongue swell up in my throat. My heart whined in my chest as it bounced against my lungs.

"Sure are!" Al exclaimed, completely unfazed. He looked at me to continue the introduction before rolling his eyes. "I'm Alfred F. Jones. This is my brother Mattie."

"How lovely!" she said in that way that you knew she meant every word. "What are you drawing Mr. Jones and Mr. Jones?"

"The farm!" Al exclaimed before holding up his sad excuse of a picture.

"Are you excited about the farm?" she laughed.

I felt my cheeks burn as Miss Hedervary's hand left my shoulder. Damn it, Al! He had to always steal everyone's attention. Usually I would have just ignored it like all the other times he did it but I was in love!

She hummed to herself as she judged his picture and then smiled softly. "I think all of our cows are black and white, Mr. Jones," she informed him. "But I'm not in charge of the farm work, so who am I to judge? It's a lovely picture of a barn. Is that you and your brother?"

"Yup!"

Her slim hand found its way to her chin and she cocked her head to the side. "And who's the red-headed boy?"

This caused Alfred to scowl. "That's not a boy. That's Grandma Jonesie."

"Of course, my bad," she said with a gentle smile. Then she turned to me and my heart began to pound again. "And, you're Matthew."

I about died. She knew my full name! Al had introduced me as Mattie but she knew my full name! It was love to a ten year old's blurry mind.

"Yes," I at last responded dryly.

"What are you drawing?" she asked me as she glanced over my shoulder, handing my brother his picture back.

There was a moment of silence in which I considered grabbing the paper and ripping it up before her very eyes, so she could never see the embarrassment that was my boyhood crush. That might have been what I did if I had felt the power in my limbs to move.

Instead she looked at the paper and I looked at her. Then she smiled and I felt myself melt into my shoes.

"Thank you for such a lovely portrait, Mr. Jones," she said gently.

"You drew the teacher?" Al asked with a strange look on his face before the door was flung open.

Everyone in the class, including Miss Hedervary, glanced to the door just as a strange boy strolled in. He was only a few years older than us, maybe fifteen, but he seemed ancient, and it was most likely due to the fact that his hair was as white as snow. His skin was a shade to match and, other than his clothes, the only thing on him that seemed to have any color whatsoever were his red eyes.

Al and I looked to each other before watching the boy stop short of our table. I hadn't even noticed his bouquet of flowers until they were being offered to the teacher.

"For the lovely Future Mrs. Beilschmidt!" he grinned at Miss Hedervary. I felt my chest twist with jealousy.

Miss Hedervary had her brows raised to her hairline but looked amused nonetheless. "Gilbert," she said in a flat tone. "I told you to stop interrupting my classes or I'll get your father on you."

This did not seem to threaten the boy as he laughed and then thrust the flowers forward. "C'mon, Elizabeta—"

"I am Miss Hedervary, your art and reading teacher," she reminded him, her tone progressively becoming more of a warning. "Do not make me get your father out of the science wing."

He raised his hands coolly and laughed. "Okay, okay, I'll leave them on the table," he stated before leaving them in the crayon box for Toris and Feliks' table. "I'm a very sick boy, though, _Miss Hedervary, _might die any day. The least you could do to ease my suffering is play along with me!"

She pointed at the door.

He laughed and headed out, reaching in his pocket and grabbing his sunglasses to put on before reaching the sunlight.

"I love you, Miss Hedervary!" he called from down the hall.

Everyone was giggling by the time our teacher reached the door and shut it, locking it this time.

* * *

The rest of the classes that day were not nearly as entertaining.

"Like math is totally taught by this like Chinaman," Feliks felt it was necessary to inform us. "He teaches like gym, too."

To everyone else that seemed to be the most daunting news of the day, but I found that I rather liked Mr. Wang. He dove right into the lessons without asking us to stand up and tell our peers our name and where we were from. It was unusual, but it spared me from the title of "Alfred's brother, Mattie" in two of the four classes I had on the Monday-Wednesday block.

The last class was Latin, taught by a Mr. Reyes. Nothing was particularly unusual about his class other than he spoke half of it in Spanish.

His Spanish was weird to me, I hardly recognized it at first because it was faster and more clipped than the language our slow talking, easy going Father Antonio slipped into on occasion. Still, there was nothing wrong with it and I learned what Alpha and Omega actually stood for in the first few minutes.

Still, there was no denying that in my fastly beating heart, art had been the best class that day.

* * *

We were exhausted as the bell tower chimed four o'clock and our stomachs were aching for the meals they had already become so accustomed to in just a week's time.

As we curiously attempted to make sense of the maze like walk path toward the cafeteria, we heard our names being called by Feliks.

"Alfred! Matthew! Like, look over here!"

We did, even if Al made an annoyed noise in response to being called out by the strange mannerisms of our classmate. There I found my face heat up as not only was there Feliks but there was Toris, a curious looking Eduard, a tiny blond haired boy looking no more than four, and the curious albino from art that morning.

"Gilbert is taking us out to eat in town," Eduard explained as we made our way to them, myself more hesitant than my brother.

"He's like really taking like just me out, because I'm like his Hall Brother," Feliks explained. "But like I totally want you two to like come with us."

"More the merrier!" Gilbert chuckled, picking up the young child as he tugged on the albino's pant leg. "Jesus H. Christ, Ludwig. Pick if you want up or down."

Al and I glanced to one another and I watched as his hand slipped into his pocket for the precious coin contained within. He was about as clueless as I was.

We had about twenty dollars between us that was our only money for the entire semester we were going to be there. With almost everything else paid for by our labor, we had promised ourselves that we would buy Grandma Jonesie a Christmas gift for the first time.

This offer, for reasons that were truly unexplainable, was almost too enticing to ignore.

"Hey, if it's money you're worried about, don't sweat it," Gilbert suddenly announced. "It's a cheap enough diner, and _Vati _gave me enough to feed my whole floor." He swatted little Ludwig's hand away from his sunglasses. "I wouldn't ask ya to waste your money on the first day!"

"Well, why didn't you say so?" Al exploded excitedly.

I smiled. I grew a great respect for Gilbert Beilschmidt that day.

* * *

While the diner and the concept of a free meal were more than appreciated that day, I could already see the fondness of fast food slipping away from me. I had never been its biggest fan, always preferring home cooked foods from our mother.

Alfred was quite the opposite.

Then again, I wasn't even sure if he was _tasting _the food that slid down the converyer belt he called a throat.

He ate every meal like it was the last one he was every going to have. While I could understand the sentiment after all we had been through, it was still odd to me.

"He's a beast!" Gilbert had laughed while he finished off his baby brother's untouched fries.

I looked at Al as my brother wiped his mouth off with his sleeve, inspite of the fact that I was holding out a napkin for him. He had a glitter to his eyes.

"Beast?" he questioned. I groaned.

He was going to keep the nickname.

* * *

There was only an hour left until curfew and bed checks by the time we had walked back from the diner and signed back on the very important list pointed out to us on the first day.

Al took the red marker hanging on the clipboard and then circled our names on the list for the farm the next day.

"This is going to be awesome," he chuckled to himself.

"Whatever," I responded before poking his side, _"Beast. _Let's get you a bath so you don't stink up the room anymore."

He laughed at my tickle and we joined our roommates back in the room. They seemed as pleased with the night as we had been, until Al decided it was time to strip down in the middle of the room and _then _grab his towel.

I just shook my head and, with modesty my brother could never seem to find in his half of the gene pool, changed out of my clothes and into a towel behind our beds.

When I came back out, I found that Al was gathering our shower stuff already. And Toris and Eduard were looking at us like we were deranged.

"Sorry about Al," I said with a rub of my neck. "He's usually more modest." That was a lie.

"You're … really skinny," Eduard muttered as he looked at my shoulders.

I blushed. I began to fumble over my words, wondering how to explain away our skeletal frames when Alfred turned around on his heels and looked to our new friends.

"We're not skinny," he said quickly. "We're building muscle."

They didn't fight this conclusion and Al returned to his more carefree disposition before looking all over the room. "Oh, geeze. What am I forgetting? Oh, right!"

He grabbed our father's coin and I sighed as Al tucked it gingerly between our wash cloths.

"You-you're taking a shower? A-At night?" Toris questioned, his voice suddenly as shaky as it was the first day.

"Duh," Al responded. "Why?"

I had the idea that most, maybe all, of the boys on our floor took morning showers. That was just bizarre to Al and me. We had always taken showers at night, else we might run out of hot water needed to cook, clean or whatever else Grandma Jonesie or our mother needed.

"You should take one in the morning," Toris said with a gleam in his eyes.

"No thanks," Al shrugged before whistling and heading out the door. "C'mon, Mattie!"

I looked at how much our rommate was trembling but followed my brother. Eduard was beginning to ask Toris what was wrong by the time I was out of earshot. I figured I should have stayed and comforted our new friend, too.

But it was getting late, and I needed to feel clean before my head met the sheets.

* * *

Al flexed in the shower, looking from one puny arm to the other.

"I think I'm getting muscle!" he exclaimed before grinning at me. "I'll give you some if you want it."

I snorted and kicked some of the draining water at him before looking back to my shower head. It was still a strange set up to me, community bathrooms. We had seen them in the gym at P.S. 102 but never thought about it much. I think it was another reason we were so persistent in showering at night.

Did shy Toris _really _shower in the morning with every one of the twenty shower heads being used?

Al began to sing, "You know that it would be untrue, you know that I would be a liar, if I was to say to you, girl, we couldn't get much higher! Come on baby, light my fire—"

I rolled my eyes and chose to ignore him. It was the only logical thing _to _do when he was singing.

We nearly jumped out of our skins when someone banged on the metal door to the bathroom.

Al turned so fast on his heels he went spiraling on the slick floor and would have hit the wall with his head if I hadn't grabbed him and propped him up in time. We looked over to the door as a familiar guard's voice called out.

"HEY! Someone taking a shower?"

This caused me to narrow my eyes. Of course someone was taking a shower, the water was on and Al was singing like an idiot. So what kind of question was that?

My mind reasoned it out soon enough, though. Maybe some pranksters liked to turn on the water and leave it running. It was something the kids on the street back in Hell's Kitchen would do, so why not? And … maybe he hadn't heard Al?

"A couple of us are!" Al yelled out as he was finally able to straighten himself and remove my support.

We heard some muttering and then the unseen door closed before opening again. This time we knew that voice. It was Vash.

"It is ten minutes until curfew!" he called and then shut the door.

Al and I looked at each other before rushing through the rest of our showers.

We made it back to the room with half a minute to go.

* * *

The next morning I woke up before anyone else.

My brother was snoring on the top bunk for once and I didn't feel a single kink in my body from strange positioning. It was a welcomed relief.

Quietly, I made my way over to the desk I shared with Al and pulled out a piece of paper and an unchewed pen without waking anyone else up.

Along with a television, Grandma Jonesie did not have the luxuries of a telephone. I promised to write her as, in her words, Alfred likes to ramble about things that matter only to him.

I had also decided that, since I was sending the letter to Father Antonio to get to her anyway, I would write a second one to him after I was done with Grandma Jonesie's.

So I began.

_Dear Grandma Jonesie,_

_I love you so much and miss you. So does Al. But we're having a great time …_

* * *

[Notes]  
*Washing machines were incredibly popular in America after the re-invention of the modern washer and dryer in the 1950's. Matt and Al most likely used the services of a laundromat which, surprisingly enough, have been around in the United States since the Wash-A-Teria in 1936. (Just thought someone might find that interesting)  
*Block schedules, in case anyone is unfamiliar, means that there are classes had every Monday, Wednesday, and every other Friday and then a second set of classes every Tuesday, Thursday, and every other Friday. Block schedules can vary, of course, but this is generally the rotation my made up institute will be carrying out.  
*Gilbert will have oculocutaneous albinism for this story and, as such, there will be many references to different glasses he wears for his eyesight and types of clothes.  
*"Chinaman" is a derrogatory term and the only reason I used it in this story was to set the tone for the time period. If anyone was offended, I deeply apologize.  
*Mr. Reyes is OC!Mexico, not to be confused with OC!Mexico created by the other member of this account. Her Mexico is a girl anyway so … yeah.  
*The song Al is singing to in the shower is "Light My Fire" by The Doors

_I apologize if any of the characterizations bother anyone, or if the pace is continuously too sluggish for peoples' tastes. There's a reason I'm concentrating on this part of the brothers' lives so much._

_I assure you, we will catch up to the place of the prologue without me writing in every week between September 1967 to December 1981 lol_

_~Right_

_P.S. VERY soon this joint account's first, well, _joint _story will be out! I really hope you look out for it and anything else Left puts out ;)  
P.S.S. lol get it? Left and Right.  
_


	6. Chapter Five: Curiouser and Curiouser

_Again, thank you all so much for the support of this story! Special thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX** _and_ **Semetastic** _for such wonderful reviews!_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Prussia, Estonia, Lithuania, Hungary, China, OC!Mexico, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians  
_Mikkel Densen = Denmark (get it?)  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, "Light My Fire" © The Doors, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Five: Curiouser and Curiouser

The second day of classes started with English with a Mr. Arthur Kirkland.

At breakfast that morning I was questioning our peers about the class and what all we were expected to know. At P.S. 102, English and Reading were the same class. To have them completely separate confused me beyond belief. If we weren't reading in English what were we doing?

"Just don't look at his eyebrows," Eduard warned as he offered Al his biscuit without much protest. "Do you want some of my food, too?"

"We're not charity cases," Al muttered in spite of himself. I barely blinked before the biscuit was gone.

"No, thanks," I responded gently before furrowing my brow at my friend. "And what do you mean don't look at his eyebrows? Is that like some sort of saying? I've never heard it before."

Ever since Al and I had arrived we had been drowned in colloquialisms we weren't familiar with. Not that it mattered, because there were several phrases that we had picked up back at Hell's Kitchen that wouldn't make any sense to me until I was older.

Alfred was glaring at me and it took a while before I realized that it was because _like _was beginning to slip into my speech patterns.

"It's no turn of phrase," Eduard assured me before finally just handing my brother his plate. "What I say is perfectly what I mean. Don't stare at his eyebrows for too long. I'd explain it but you wouldn't understand until you saw him. And by the time you understand you'll have looked at them too long."

My frown deepened. Eduard was being cryptic.

This entire school was cryptic, as I reflected on it.

Beside me, my brother snorted. "So your advice is you don't have advice?"

"I tried my hardest," Eduard sighed. "But don't worry about the _class_ exactly, you guys. It's English. It's easy."

"Yeah, you also said Math was easy," Alfred responded before point an accusing fork at Eduard. "And besides, you've got glasses."

To this our roommate stiffened and scowled. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"Glasses make you smarter. You having glasses is like cheating," Al surmised before eating what was left on the plate.

This caused me to roll my eyes at my simpleton of a brother. I was the only one who seemed to notice as Lithuania raced down the stairs and sprinted to the far end of the table. He had wet hair and his dress shirt was sloppily mismatched. He looked out of breath and pale as he settled on the end and sat there without breakfast.

I frowned and told myself that was another reason Al and I didn't take morning showers. We didn't want to be late.

* * *

I wasn't really sure what to make of the eyebrows when I first saw them. I just stared.

Mr. Kirkland was not a particularly cheery looking fellow, not that tall in spite of a slight heel to his old looking dress shoes. He was finely dressed, or as finely as anyone on scholarship to a work-and-live Catholic school cared to notice, but his short cropped blond hair was dishevel looking.

It was definitely the brows which seemed to hang on his forehead that set the tone for the general crankiness, however. He entered the room, dropped a strange combination of Grammar and History text books on the desk and then glared right at me.

I looked to Al who was drawing cows on his notebook and not paying a bit of attention.

"You two!" Mr. Kirkland barked. "Pay attention in my class!"

"Wait, I'm not finished with my cow!" Alfred pleaded as he colored in the blob like spot he drew on the paper.

I slapped myself on the forehead and took little comfort in the fact that it was no longer _my _half of our two-person show that was on the teacher's bad side.

Well, I suppose I could never say that my brother's general lack of observation never did anything _positive _for me after that point.

Mr. Kirkland stared at my brother for a moment before sitting on the edge of his desk and waiting patiently. The rest of the class was utterly silent, seemingly aware of some danger I was only hinted of and my brother was utterly unobservant of.

It was nerve racking and I could only shift glances between my stupid brother and the eyebrows of Mr. Kirkland.

When Al finished, he looked up and raised his brows expectantly at Mr. Kirkland. My gut twisted, but even then I noticed something strange.

Alfred never looked at Mr. Kirkland's eyebrows. He looked the man in the eyes and, I knew, it was because that was what Dad always said to do.

"Are you quite finished?" Mr. Kirkland questioned with an impressive raise of his brows.

"Oh, yeah, definitely. For now."

I groaned in my throat, too frightened to let it escape.

"Mr. Jones, is it?" Mr. Kirkland questioned, clipped and dangerous.

"One of," Alfred responded and I shook my head at him, praying he wouldn't do the introduction. It was a fruitless effort. "I'm Alfred F. Jones. This is my brother Mattie."

I closed my eyes and sighed.

Mr. Kirkland just absorbed it all.

"Do you know what class you are in, Mr. _Alfred F. Jones?" _

Al looked at our teacher for a moment, squinted, rolled his eyes to the back of his head, and then continued looking the man in the eyes. "Uh, grammar."

_"'Uh-_grammar,'" the English teacher repeated sharply. "So you are not in art?"

"Not since yesterday."

"Ah, I see, very well," Mr. Kirkland got back onto his feet and, somehow, seemed taller. "Can you repeat sentences with perfect grammar, Mr. Jones?"

"I don't know—"

"Because," Mr. Kirkland interrupted, "if you _can_ than there really is no need for some silly professor to teach you anymore, is there? And you could draw cows in class all day without a care. Wouldn't _that _be more fun than grammar class?"

"Yeah," Al shrugged.

"So, Mr. Jones," the teacher began with a deeper tone to his voice. "Can you repeat this sentence with perfect pronunciation and grammar?"

Al stared expectantly. I debated about painting my hair black or going bald. Maybe no one would point us out as twins.

_"How now brown cow," _escaped the teacher's lips.

Cocking his head to the side, Al blinked and repeated with a surprised stutter, "H-how now brown cow?"

Mr. Kirkland leaned back, a hand on his desk, and _tsked_ at my brother. He shook his head, his mop of hair flopping back and forth with the sway. I half expected his eyebrows to escape his forehead.

"I am afraid that your English is sub-par, Mr. Jones," Mr. Kirkland announced with a tinge of amusement in his words. He then waved a hand to the blackboard behind him. "Would you like to get some practice? Say, writing that very sentence fifty times on the board while I introduce the _rest_ of the class to their first assignment?"

He bit at his lip and I continued to stare at Alfred until he replied, "That's okay. I'll sit and do the intro-stuff."

Mr. Kirkland waited a moment before bursting out into laughter. I rubbed my temples. I kept telling myself it was the worst day of my life. I felt ready to throw up and Al just _sat _there.

"It was not a request or a suggestion, Mr. Jones," our teacher said, his words becoming dark. "Now, get off your arse, find some chalk, and get writing."

"What's an arse?"

Before I knew it, Mr. Kirkland had yanked my brother out of the desk chair and had him by the ear, down the row of students, and next to the board. He shoved a piece of chalk into my confused brother's hand and pointed at the board.

"One hundred times. Now."

* * *

I felt utterly humiliated to admit that I even knew Al as we left that class.

Al was incredibly amused, though. We left the English classroom as Mr. Kirkland took his seat at his desk and turned to check on Alfred's handiwork for the first time.

We swore we heard an amused chuckle as, at the end of the hundred sentences, Al had drawn a cow similar to the one on his papers.

* * *

Our classes for the rest of the morning were fairly standard. After English was music where we found the man in the stuffy shirt from our first visit to the school, Mr. Edelstein, was the teacher.

He stared at us as we all stared at the mole on his chin and then he, in a nervous twitch, sat at the grand piano in the center of the room. We listened to orchestra-worthy performances for half an hour and then he stood back up and introduced himself and the class.

"He has to play music at the beginning of every class," Tino, one of our classmates, explained. "People say he does it to work up the nerve for public speaking."

Then there was Mr. Beilschmidt's science class. He got angry in less than ten minutes because he noticed that the row of desks next to us were slightly more to the left than they had been when we first entered the classroom. The man glared at us, told us to fix our desks, and then continued with his lesson. He completely ignored as his two sons entered the room randomly, went to the storage closet, and came back out with several metal pipes.

Gilbert gave our small 'group' a wave when he noticed us before bopping his younger brother over the head for poking him with a pipe.

Our final class before lunch happened to be history, and I felt my stomach churning again as I noticed that we were going back to the very room we had had English in just earlier.

We entered and Mr. Kirkland was standing by his desk, leaning over an opened history book before glancing up to see us and our classmates re-enter. He grew a strange expression and cocked his head to the side as Alfred and I ended up sitting in the same seats.

"Have you seen your cows yet, Mr. Jones?" he asked.

"Right after lunch!" Al chimed back.

I muttered into my palms as I covered my face. The day would not end soon enough, that was for sure.

Some people were muttering around me, though, and I could not help but look up and see for myself what it was over. I furrowed my brow.

Alfred was getting out his notebook and flipping through the pages and pages of cows he had drawn that day without a care in the world. But up at the front of the class, Mr. Kirkland was looking down at his lesson plan with a smile that could only be described as _affectionate._

It looked … unnatural to him.

* * *

When we ate lunch, I could not help but notice that Toris had yet to join us. We did get more acquainted with Tino and his friends, particularly Al and a rambunctious, spiky haired boy named Mikkel Densen.

Still it seemed odd to me. I hadn't even gotten to speak with our brunette roommate yet that day.

"He runs off on his own sometimes," Eduard assured us.

"Like, he gets real nervous. It's like totally weird," Feliks stated with a shrug.

I could not help but notice that they seemed slightly on edge over the situation as well. It made me get a strange, sickening feeling in my stomach. Suspicion was never one of my strong suits, that was much more up Al's alley. I did not like accusing people of, well, anything.

But some of these things were just simply too strange to not note.

"I think I'm going to ask Toris what's been up with him when I see him later," I informed Al when we were heading toward the farm class.

"Maybe he just wants to be alone, Mattie," Al shrugged.

I should have foreseen that talking to my brother would be next to useless. He had his mind set on one thing: the very thing drawn all over his notebooks.

* * *

The farming class was one of the few optional electives on the schedule for older students. Al and I reached the opened barn in what was supposed to be our play clothes for the weekends and found ourselves in a swarm of high school aged boys.

There were two reasons for this.

One was that Gilbert was a very galvanizing student who, despite his rough exterior and questionable infatuation with a certain art teacher, was almost as genius at science and engineering as his father. Gilbert had announced to his peers that day that for farm class he had invented a pipe gun which shot out potatoes with enough force to blow a hole in the barn door.

Second was the teacher.

I met my first love the day before with Miss Hedervary, our gentle yet stern art and reading teacher.

Al met _his _as we walked up to see Miss Katyusha Braginskaya for the first time.

The on-campus farm manager to St. Francis deSales' highly productive agriculture department was a twenty-three year old immigrant from some territory in Soviet Russia, which made her almost impossible to understand. She was clueless and on the verge of tears every couple of minutes as she clung to her pitch fork and timidly attempted to side-step into the barn's office throughout her short introduction to the class.

While, true to Dad's lessons from our youth, Alfred had always managed to look his superiors in the eyes without fail before, he suddenly could not lift his gaze from … a certain part of Miss Braginskaya's anatomy.

"She has the biggest rack I've ever seen!" an older boy in front of us announced in what was supposed to be a whisper.

I stared worriedly at my hypnotized twin.

"Eh, Al?"

"I know what a rack is now, Mattie," Al muttered to me. "I never knew when we were back home. But now I do."

He never did race into the herd of cattle in the pasture to look for a chocolate cow, therein being trampled by the lone bull which eyed our mass of testosterone the entire time we were at the farm. So, I suppose, there was that to be happy over.

* * *

It took a while for anyone, including myself, to notice that no one had seen Toris since history. Again, multiple people assured me that it happened, Toris was a weird kid. He kept to himself.

I was uneasy about it, though. Even more uneasy about how perfectly content Al was.

"It doesn't bother you at all, Mr. Detective?" I asked skeptically at one point.

He gave me a bewildered look before shrugging. "I'm not a detective. I'm a cop. And no. It's not like back home where you're not supposed to walk in the alleys at dark, Mattie. Everything's fine here. Everyone's nice and, geeze, I kinda finally know what you and Grandma Jonesie have been talking about with mass all this time," he explained as he pulled out Dad's coin and rubbed it gently between his fingers. "I feel like there's something there. Watching me. I'm not scared of anything."

We walked past Bonnnefoy Hall, nearly getting knocked over by two of the security guards we had not seen before. They didn't so much as say a word to us, just continued their patrol.

"That's rude," I stated with a bit of annoyance.

"No, they're just patrolling," Al responded with a smile lighting up his face. He admired their uniforms from afar.

* * *

We joined the clustered confusion later as we gathered around the doors of Bonnefoy Hall. We had been enjoying a particularly intense game of Frisbee when people began screaming and yelling from the boarding hall. Even the Lamar girls were gathering on the grounds, staying a respectable distance as they were surrounded by the nuns.

Then the ambulance came and theories were flying up everywhere.

Al grabbed my hand and I could feel his palms getting sweaty with anticipation. The security guards were running back and forth frantically, talking to the arriving officers, to Headmaster Vargas, and to the teachers who were walking out of their apartments.

Everyone was asking what was going on.

"There's Mr. Kirkland!" Al exclaimed to me, tugging at my arm. "Let's see if he knows anything."

"No," I said shortly.

Al gave me a look. "Why not?"

"He scares me," I admitted timidly.

To this my brother rolled his eyes and began to drag me along toward our history and English professor when Vash ripped through the crowd.

"Alfred and Matthew Jones! Eduard von Bock!" he yelled, grabbing our attentions. "Come with me!"

We joined a nervous Eduard in following our Hall Brother. Al grabbed my shoulder and was about to whisper the question we were both thinking when we saw the gurney rolling out and realized that beneath the black and blued face of a boy beaten within an inch of his life was our fourth, uncalled roommate.

* * *

We got many questions that night about everything.

They asked us about the last time we had seen Toris, why he would have been found beaten to a bloody pulp outside our room. The works.

There was nothing for my brother or I to hide and we knew better than to answer the police's questions with anything but perfect honesty. But I was so nervous I could barely stand it. I kept grabbing Al's hand and he would squeeze it supportively, like he would do on the nights I cried over Mom.

"Are you two close?" one officer asked us with a strange look on his face.

"Mattie's the only family I got 'cept for Grandma Jonesie," Al responded simply. "And she can't come to school. She's too old."

The officer was silent, taking in the response. "Would you get jealous if anyone tried to be closer to your brother than you?"

Al blinked as if he had been asked something in a different language. He then cocked his head to the side.

"I don't care if Mattie's got friends," he responded slowly, as if trying to comprehend his own answer. "Afterall, we're closer than friends. We're brothers. And no one can take that away."

It was a simple, stupid, crude answer. And I couldn't have been more satisfied with the gentle nod the officer gave in response.

Al's hand loosened in the lack of tension neither of us realized we had.

* * *

That night, Eduard was a nervous mess. He barely talked to us before sulking off to his bed.

Al and I didn't feel to great either. It hadn't taken us long to realize that they had originally suspected us, newcomer troubled kids from Hell's Kitchen, to be the culprits. And that stung, because Dad had always preached to us that 'common sense deductions' had no use in police investigations. It made people jump to hurtful conclusions.

We went together to Vash's room for more information on Toris as well as a simple request.

"He is going to be in the hospital for a while," Vash said with little emotion added to the facts. "But he will be fine." He did seem to at least _try _to soften his face when he said this but it just came out looking wrong and he stopped too soon in any case.

The Hall Brother then scowled harshly at me. "And why would you want your letter back?"

"I have stuff to add to it," I explained.

"Well, I already sent it this morning," Vash responded rather harshly. He then sighed and rubbed his eyes. "I know you probably want to tell your loved ones about what happened here today, but believe me: don't. It'll just cause unnecessary worry and give St. Francis deSales a bad reputation. It's a good school, we just need to find the bullies who did this."

My lips were snapped closed and I was absolutely _floored_ by this. I had to tell Grandma Jonesie and Father Antonio about this. Our _roommate_ was almost beaten to death!

But all that could come from my throat was a meek "okay."

I looked worriedly to Alfred who was glaring daggers at our Hall Brother.

It made me sad to see the suspicious glares my brother was shooting because it meant that we had lost that security. For the first time in so long we had felt stable ground beneath our feet and, so soon, it had been ripped away from us.

* * *

"Here."

Al handed me the precious, precious coin and hugged me tightly.

"Look, Al, I appreciate it but … but it was Dad's and you want it more," I reasoned. "You're going to be a cop. I don't even know what I'm going to be."

He did not let go of his hug, just buried his face in my shoulder.

"It'll keep you safe, Mattie," he muttered into my wrinkling shirt.

I just hugged him back. "I want you to be safe, too," I sighed.

"Well, I'm a hero," he said, drying himself up and pushing off from me slightly. He rubbed his nose against his sleeve sloppily. "You don't have to worry about me."

But I still did. And for good reason.

* * *

_Okay, so I had a little bit too much fun writing with Mr. Kirkland. Not to worry, he shows up later so I wasn't just wasting your time. Entirely. Promise, promise. _

_Please review!  
~Right_


	7. Chapter Six: Money

_Very special thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX** _for a lovely review. It means so much to have your support!_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Prussia, Poland, Estonia, Lithuania, Hungary, England, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, China, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, "Light My Fire" © The Doors, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Six: Money

A week or so went by and the suspicions people had about Toris' attack made themselves known.

Al didn't like having so many people looking at him or me suspiciously.

"I don't get it," he muttered to me one evening as we scrubbed the bathroom floors. "Are they blind or something? You couldn't hurt a fly, Mattie!"

I sighed and reached for the mop bucket. "You couldn't either, Al. Maybe it's just because they don't know us."

"Yeah, they don't know Dad was a cop," my brother said decisively before scooting around and resting on his rump. He looked around the newly cleaned bathroom with a bit of a smirk clinging to his face. "Everybody knows that cops are good guys. Heroes."

This brought me to shaking my head. "If I remember, nobody back home liked cops."

"We _did_ live on Clinton."

I gave him a look and he returned it. Then we allowed ourselves a little laugh.

St. Francis might have lost our trust, but we knew as long as it was the two of us we'd be safe.

* * *

A week had passed us by before Grandma Jonesie and Father Antonio's letters were taped to our door.

We had been playing all day, enjoying the mid-October activities on campus. Al, who had somehow managed to be in Miss Braginskaya's good graces, got together with Gilbert and some of the other older kids for a hay ride.

We did not get back until after curfew because Al was in charge of cleaning up the barn along with the other older kids. Somehow I got wrangled into the duty as well. Not that I complained too much. It was thrilling to have a good excuse for why we weren't in bed by curfew, one that came from Miss Braginskaya herself.

If Al would ever remember how to pronounce her name.

"Briginskiya is an awesome teacher," he would say as we cleaned up the beer cans left by our older companions.

"That's wrong," I corrected. "It's Braginskaya."

"That's what I said."

I gave him a dulled glare. "No. It isn't."

"Really it should be _Braginski."_

The both of us were rather startled as we had figured that all the older boys had headed off into one of the pastures to finish off the night in complete, inebriated bliss. But as we turned, Al and I found ourselves looking up to a very tall, looming presence.

He was one of the older boys who was supposed to help us clean up. He was a giant, older and bigger than us with platinum blonde hair that was rather reminiscent of our busty teacher. The boy had a soft smile which, for some reason, was really unnerving when seen on him.

"Is it?" Al squeaked, grabbing for my hand behind our backs.

"Yes," the boy said gently. "It is better than the youngest, though. They got her last name wrong entirely. Stupid Americans."

I felt Alfred jerk slightly before he got up, stretching himself as far as he could go, as if he could ever measure up to the bigger boy. "Hey!" my brother growled. "America's _awesome!_ Best country ever!"

The boy raised his brows. "Is it? What countries are you from?"

"America."

"So how do you know?"

In a blurred moment, Al had my hand and was jerking me back toward Bonnefoy hall. He would have swung the door open and we might never have noticed that the letter was taped there if I hadn't somehow managed to take the lead on the way there.

* * *

Father Antonio's letter was nurturing and sweet.

It also brought me to realize that there was a certain hollowness to the short paragraphs which beckoned us to aim our ambitions more toward the duties God had set forth for us. He said we had taken the first step by going to a _school of God._

That settled wrong in my stomach for some reason. I knew we were thankful to have somewhere warm to sleep, our own beds, three meals a day, and a place to learn … but it was getting harder for me to think of it as a blessing.

If St. Francis was a _blessing_ then why did we have no choice other than to go there or starve to death? Why would I consider it a blessing that we were only there because our mother had died?

Things I had never questioned before were no longer making sense to me.

This revelation was around the time that Al, who was always so skeptical of everything, began eating it up.

I felt slightly betrayed.

* * *

When we first opened the letter from Grandma Jonesie, I thought it was a mistake.

Then I thought the clipping from the newspaper was supposed to hold some significance, but it was neither an entire column or relevant at all.

Instead, my brother and I found ourselves squinting past the black text in order to better make out the thick red pen lines which spelled out Grandma Jonesie's short prose.

_I'm proud of you._

_Do well in school._

_Look out for one another._

_Pray._

_Love,  
Grandma Jonesie._

* * *

We didn't talk much about the letter for the rest of the week. In fact, we didn't say anything about it at all.

By the time I had worked up the nerve to mention it, we were in the middle of the Friday morning rush: getting dressed, brushing our teeth, and heading to breakfast.

"Do you think she wrote it on newspaper because she didn't want to waste it?" I tried weakly.

Al snorted. "She can't buy paper anymore, Mattie," he said, as if I hadn't already thought that for myself a thousand times.

I watched him bend over and tie his shoes.

"She can't even remember what day of the month it is to pay the rent," I reminded him, the back of my mind gnawing on the fact that a soon-to-be eleven year old shouldn't have these sorts of thoughts. "How is she supposed to remember what food to get at the store if she doesn't write it down on paper?"

Al shook his head and stood up.

We ignored the fact that the halls were emptying as all our hall mates made their way down to cafeteria. It was going to be hell trying to find a spot in line.

My brother bit his lip, something I had already been doing. He then looked at me worriedly.

"Is this our fault?"

I didn't answer because I wasn't for sure.

But my gut said _yes._

* * *

The weekend was the first of our weekends to drag on. It seemed as though the Monday classes could not come early enough. It was only Sunday morning and I already was beginning to feel a little stir crazy.

It was a strange sensation. It was almost time for mass and I neither wanted to stay in the room or leave for the short walk to the chapel.

After a few moments of this I began to realize what was wrong.

"I want to go home," I said to my brother in hushed tones even though Eduard had left for the showers already.

Alfred took a moment as he ran his fingers through his hair and then looked at me. We were quiet for a little while before he sighed and sat on the floor. He always preferred the rug as opposed to chairs for some reason.

"We can't," he reasoned. "Grandma Jonesie, Father Antonio—they're all counting on us, Mattie. Plus, how is Grandma Jonesie going to get any better if we're there eating all the food and spending all the money?"

My face got hot and I roughly plopped myself onto my bed. "I know," I said with a groan. "And I like it here, Al. But I'm worried. And I miss Grandma Jonesie."

We gave away to silence again and I thought I was going to scream when I heard my brother shuffle back to his feet.

"Let's go pray about it," he said in a strangely chipper tone.

I lifted my head enough to stare at him warily. "Since when did you pray over everything?" I asked skeptically.

He gave me a look over and then scowled. "Since when didn't you?"

* * *

Because St. Francis deSales _was _a Catholic parish, you had to sign a piece of paper which said you had attended chapel. You would have to have a very good excuse to miss and it could very well get you detention, a talk with Headmaster Vargas, or expulsion.

It was also the only time anyone saw the Archbishop who was the 'religious oversight' of the school. He was higher than even our headmaster on the food chain.

He came frequently and mostly observed the boys and girls during the proceedings. We were supposed to be on our best behavior on those days.

There were a few times that he was not watching our congregation of students, however. Those were the most nerve racking for me. I kept imagining that he had eyes in the back of his head, waiting for my brother to do something stupid because his back was turned. Then he would pounce.

I told this to Al once, pleading for him to be on better behavior, but it just got me a dumfounded stare.

"I don't act up in church," he said haughtily. His eyes wondered away from me in thought before returning. "Uh, not _anymore."_

My worrying was useless for various other reasons, however. It was actually something my brother had pointed out to me.

On those days that the Archbishop did not watch the students, his eyes were dead set on the set of pews for the faculty and staff.

It seemed strange at first but once Mr. Kirkland began showing up for services, we noticed that he had never been to any before. He also seemed set on only coming when the Archbishop was there and then he seemed bored and frustrated throughout the entirety of the service.

* * *

After service, Al and I had planned to write back another letter to Grandma Jonesie and Father Antonio. Al was the one who decided that they should be separate so as to tell Father Antonio in his letter that we needed him to look after Grandma Jonesie.

I had never been so torn between wanting to stay and wanting to leave a place.

It was going to be a fairly serious day, that much was for sure, when we were beckoned from across the lawn.

"Like, guys! Hey! Like, totally come over here!"

Alfred moaned under his breath and I nudged him with my elbow to remind him about manners. We then met up with Feliks.

Feliks was an interesting case for us because he was sort of that friend that you didn't necessarily like the company of but kept him around anyway. It seemed to be the same reaction everyone had with him so, if nothing else, we were only as bad as the rest of St. Francis.

"You guys look like totally bored," he said with an arrogant smirk that did little to light up his lazy eyes.

"We were going to go do some homework," Al explained. It wasn't a total lie, we did have homework.

Feliks looked us over and shook his head. "That's like a total bummer. You guys should like put that off and like totally come to town with me and like Gilbert. He totally like asked me to invite you."

Al's eyes lit up. "Really?"

I frowned slightly, remembering our money situation.

"I'm sorry, Feliks," I said with a sigh. "Al and I _really _have to watch our money."

This made my brother's eager expression falter but he didn't argue. We were in a tough spot and no amount of complaining was about to make it any better.

Feliks saw this notable change in our characters and waved his hand, as if it was supposed to smack our troubles away. The mental image made me smile slightly.

"Gilbert'll like totally pay our way," he reasoned with a shrug. "And he's like not got that like brat with him this time. Like, how awesome is that?"

* * *

The last part had been a bit of a careless assumption on Feliks' part. Ludwig was indeed tagging along with his older brother.

But Al and I didn't mind. In fact, we rather liked Ludwig's added company. It brought a new light to Gilbert for us and cemented the idea that he wasn't just Hall Brother but a _real _brother.

"I wanted to take you guys out to eat and stuff," he said with a smirk. "Mostly because I'm awesome like that. Probably the most awesome Hall Brother St. Francis ever had." It was something Al and I would not deny. Vash wasn't much competition. "But I also wanted to apologize a bit."

This made my twin and I look to one another and then back to Gilbert.

"What for?" Al asked, completely lost.

Gilbert laughed hesitantly and rubbed his neck. "The whole barn-thing the other night. My buddies and I were kind of jerks to leave you two to pick up our mess. Totally wasn't thinking that one through. Not one of my more awesome moments. But I'll make it up to you today. How about that?"

We told him it wasn't necessary, but who were we to refuse free meals?

It took our minds off Grandma Jonesie's situation for a while, at least.

* * *

One of the numerous problems which came from growing up in Hell's Kitchen was that you learned to trust nobody except your own flesh and blood. And, sometimes, you couldn't even trust them.

But I accepted a free milkshake from Gilbert without second thought, just like my brother.

The two of us were sinking back into the old securities. Perhaps not with St. Francis itself but with the family it was creating with the boys going there. The job of Hall Brother, after all, wasn't supposed to be about bed checks and keeping kids from running in the halls.

Gilbert was on top of the other aspects, though he'd be the first to tell you he was miserable at maintaining house rules.

Feliks ran off to the toy store across the street and Al was preoccupied with telling the man at the dairy bar how big the cows at the school were getting, so for a little while it seemed like it was just Gilbert and me.

Ludwig had fallen asleep in the booth, using his brother's lap as a pillow. Gilbert didn't even seem to notice him.

"So how are you and your brother doing with classes and shit?"

I stared at the older boy like he had just slapped me in the face.

The albino blinked behind the light rims of his sunglasses before realizing his mistake and laughing. "Oh, I meant shoot. Shit, wasn't supposed to cuss in front of you. Oh, fuck."

It wasn't as thought I hadn't heard profanities before, it was just that they had never come from a _Catholic _school boy before. One whose father was a teacher no less. And had a baby brother sleeping like an angel on his lap.

Knowing it was best to intervene, I responded. "Uh, we're doing good. I think. I can't get Al to do much of his math, though. He's only worried about cows. And history for some reason. But I think he's just trying to impress Mr. Kirkland."

Gilbert either was too embarrassed to note my kindness or had already brushed it off. "What? Eyebrows?"

"Yeah?"

He snorted and shrugged his shoulders. "Trust me, kid. Don't listen to a word that British pansy's got to say. English and history are stupid. Ludwig here could learn it. It's all memorization." Gilbert grew a wide grin on his face and pointed his straw at me. _"Science! _That's where it's all at. _That's _how the world works."

I nodded, accepting that at least _he _found the statement to be true.

He then cocked his head to the side and stared at me. I had done well in the past weeks to not be so obvious when I was staring at his red eyes, but when they were staring straight into mine it was made a bit more difficult.

"So, if school's alright, what's eating at you?" Gilbert questioned casually.

The way he phrased it, I knew there was no feigning ignorance. He knew something was wrong and I would be incapable of denying it.

Then again, I might have just lacked my brother's skill at bull shitting on the spot.

"We're just a little worried about our grandma, is all," I confessed lowly. My eyes lowered to my milkshake and I just felt all the guilt from earlier mounting on my shoulders again. "We came to school here because she didn't have any money. And now she _still _doesn't have money, but we're not there to help out."

I looked up after an exasperated sigh to see Gilbert's cool demeanor melt into a hardened expression. I felt nervous. He looked just like Mr. Beilschmidt at that moment.

"Hey, if you want money, the school will pay you," he said gently.

My face dropped and I looked at him in utter confusion. "What?"

"Yeah, the school'll pay you," he continued. "That's why I'm a Hall Brother. It's a lot of hours, more hours than you'll ever need for a week. And for every hour you have over, you get paid back by the school. It's a work study."

He must have been lying, I knew it was too good to be true.

"Between you and your brother, I think you could make quite a bit of money," he said with a thoughtful nod. "Tell you what, talk to Vash tonight and sign up for an extra shift in the next couple of weeks. God's honest truth! Just one extra shift and you'll be making money."

* * *

When I shared the information with Al he had demanded that we not spend another minute without an added shift.

Saying our thanks to Gilbert and Feliks (and Ludwig), we raced to the top floor of Bonnefoy and down the hall to Vash's room. We were immediately scolded for our running, but we were too excited to care.

It felt like we were in on some secret. The feeling of having a close friendship with an older boy, especially someone popular like Gilbert, was almost as rewarding as the prospect of getting paid to do silly chores.

"Do you need extra money?" Vash questioned us immediately upon hearing our request.

"Yes," Al said shortly. He wasn't rude necessarily, but something in his eyes let Vash know not to press the issue further.

Our Hall Brother frowned before nodding. "Alright then, here," he said before walking to his desk and pulling a clipboard out of the first drawer. "We are set for the next week and a half, but after that you can sign up for another work shift. Anything you were already thinking of doing?"

We looked at each other and a conversation from what seemed like an eternity before immediately came to mind.

"Yeah, the night laundry," Al answered.

Vash scowled more and handed us a pen. "Alright, sign up for what you want to, but keep in mind that it's a lot of work. And it's late at night. It seems like everyone who signs up for it turns out to be lazier than they first thought. And their grades slip." He looked at Al in particular. "On a scholarship you can't afford to let your grades slip too much. Understand?"

Al had already signed us up. "Yeah, yeah. We can do it."

* * *

_This is approaching the point of no return, my friends. Thank you so much for staying tuned thus far, but I'll go ahead and warn you that the next chapter will be unsettling for some people. So, in advance, I apologize. _

_Please, please review! I appreciate any feedback, really!  
~Right_

P.S. Left and I have started posting our first joint-fic for this account. Please check it out ;) Left has made a BEAUTIFUL introduction for it. It's worth checking out just for that and knowing what you're about to get into. My story arc for it is next.  



	8. Chapter Seven: When I Changed

_Thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX** _and _**Semetastic**_ for your continued support and reviews!_

_**WARNING: THIS CHAPTER DOES CONTAIN UNDER AGED RAPE.**  
_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Austria, Switzerland, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland, England, Denmark, Norway, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, **Child Abuse**, **Rape**, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Seven: When I Changed

"So I was watching the track team practice yesterday," Al enlightened me as we crossed the front lawn and headed toward Baird Hall for our music class with Mr. Edelstein.

It was only the two of walking together so there was no one else to comment. I merely gave my brother an expectant look.

The average person would have probably questioned why my brother would bother to watch the track team's practices, but I knew it was best not to question him. Knowing him, it probably had something to do with the fact that the track and field practices were held near the cow pasture.

"I found out that the reason Vash hasn't been bugging us so much in the hall is because he's started winter conditioning," he finally revealed.

This seemed a bit peculiar to me if only because of the way Alfred spat out Vash's name like it hurt. He hadn't had a single problem with our Hall Brother from what I could remember so it struck me as unusual.

I asked what the importance of this discovery was when my brother waved his finger knowingly at me.

"Do you know what Vash _does _for track?"

"No," I said simply.

"He's a thrower," Al informed me, his eyes lighting up like a dog on the hunt. "He's got a good arm on him. I bet he could out throw Babe!"

This made me scoff. "Al, no one could out throw Babe Ruth."

My brother was not phased by the rebuttal. "But it's not just distance, you have to be _really _strong to throw shot put like that, right? So that means Vash is a lot stronger than he looks. Which is scary, because he already looks big as a bull, y'know?"

The hair on the back of my neck was starting to prickle as we entered Baird Hall and escaped a chilly, autumn wind.

"What are you getting at, Alfred?" I questioned rather sternly.

"Don't you think it's odd that whoever attacked Toris was able to beat him so easily?" Al asked me. "He might be a timid guy, but he wasn't a push over. And they were able to beat him up on the floor, which is always patrolled by Vash or by the security guards."

I frowned at him. "You're not supposed to jump to conclusions just because they make sense, Al."

"I'm not!" he defended. "I want evidence first."

Knowing it was useless, I dropped my side of the conversation.

* * *

The night Toris returned to the room was fitted with chaos, stress, relief, curiosity, and confusion.

It was the last week of October and he reported to us that he had somewhat managed to keep up with his school work from the hospital room. The right side of his face was so heavily bandaged still that I had to continuously elbow Al. He wanted to ask if Toris' eye was still there.

Eduard revealed to Toris that he had every intention of being his tutor until Toris was firmly capable of continuing the semester.

Al offered to be a body guard.

"I won't need one," Toris said in a voice that was cracked both with the damage done by the same attack that left finger pints curled around his throat and some emotion that was bubbling to the surface of his face. "I'm not going to be in this hall soon. I want to move."

"Why?" I asked, hurt and confused myself.

"Because I can't go home," Toris choked. "Even with everything that happens, this school is still better than my _tėvas."_

* * *

We all silently watched Toris like he was a bug under a magnifying glass for the next few days. None of us, not even the gentle Tino, could think of anything to say or ask.

So we watched him as if waiting for him to crack.

He either was stuck in his own world, oblivious to our observations, or had already pushed himself so far away emotionally that there was no disturbing him anymore.

* * *

Halloween brought out an interesting side to Mr. Kirkland as we found out.

In spite of the fact that we were supposed to be learning about the Revolution, a time period which left the history teacher rather revolted, our history lessons suddenly all became about the Salem Witch Trials. Our English class completely dropped grammar from discussion and instead we were all reading our creative writing scary stories instead.

The oddest thing, though, was that Mr. Kirkland himself was no longer the dry, gritty facts-and-no-fun teacher. The way he talked about the ghouls and ghosts of the scary stories almost sounded like he thought they were _real. _

Even Alfred thought it was hilarious.

That was, until Mr. Kirkland began to give us more of his opinion on the Salem Witch Trials.

"Really, when it comes down to it, it's the intolerance of the collective religion that caused all the senseless genocide," he told as he sat on the edge of his desk. "It causes one to think how many of the participators in 1692 actually read their damned book."

It was probably the first class period under Mr. Kirkland where I was completely engaged.

"Do the Puritans use a different Bible?" asked Mikkel who looked as though he was having a hard time trying to keep up with Mr. Kirkland's time jumps.

Mir. Kirkland's thick brows raised and he laced his fingers together as he leaned forward, his elbows on his dangling knees. "Mr. Densen, the Puritans had what you might call a different _translation_ of your text, but the fact that even today Christians find themselves too arrogant to read their own damned book is the problem." His green eyes darted about the room. "We're in a Catholic school, aren't we? How many of you fine examples of modern Catholicism can tell me where to find the Book of Job?"

I glanced about before settling my sights on my brother who had a strange scowl put upon his face, his eyebrows knitted together on his forehead.

In Al's eyes I saw something reflected that seemed like hurt.

It was then that I realized that Mr. Kirkland had just disappointed my twin.

"What's the Book of Jobs got to do with the Bible?"

This caused our teacher to laugh and he straightened himself up yet again. "It's one of the collected chapters of your own religious text," Mr. Kirkland clarified when his laughter died down. "This is where religion is failing in the modern world. How seriously am I to take the words of a religious text that its own _followers _haven't bothered to read?"

"Doesn't it all mean the same!" Al suddenly exploded from his chair, earning the surprised looks of every person in the room. "Doesn't it all mean that you're supposed to listen to what God says?"

Here Mr. Kirkland stood up, though he did not move toward us. He merely saw the challenge in my brother's eyes. "If so, pray tell, how are you supposed to know the will of your god if you don't read the word you believe he sent to you?"

"Go to mass!" Al snorted like the bulls he loved.

"And you believe everything the Father has to say?" Mr. Kirkland questioned skeptically. "What if he lies? How would you ever know?"

"You know because it's not what God would want!"

"How would you know he didn't want it if you don't read what he has sent you?"

My brother gritted his teeth and glared at our teacher. I could see his hamster wheel spinning out of control as his mind desperately searched for a nice retort.

"Fuck you!"

I felt my forehead hit the desk before I realized I had fallen out of my seat. I had apparently broken the silence that followed my brother's explosion because by the time my head had stopped spinning and I could pull myself back to my seat, Al and Mr. Kirkland were out the door, Al held by his ear.

* * *

By lunch that day I still hadn't seen my brother, but I did learn that he had become school legend by 11:30.

He was considered the First Martyr of Bonnefoy. I got several claps on the shoulder from older people who could not tell the difference between the two of us.

My nerves were calmed when I did see him later having to help the janitors with throwing out the trash.

When he turned and saw Feliks, Tino, Eduard, Mikkel, Emile, and me walking by he gave us a shit-eating grin and waved enthusiastically.

At least he was having fun with his new punishment.

* * *

It was well past dinner by the time that Al drug himself into our four-person room again. He smelled like garbage and looked like he had been rolling around in the pastures.

But something about him also seemed rather satisfied, albeit exhausted.

"You have a lot of assignments to do," Eduard said as soon as my brother walked in. "And it's almost bedtime. I don't know how you're going to get it all done."

Alfred waved a hand at this and yawned. "I gotta take a shower first."

I took one sniff and concurred.

"And make it soon, Al," I kidded as I looked over my filthy brother.

He grabbed his shower things and began to strip. Alfred glanced at me once his shirt was off and cocked his head to the side. "Hey, aren't you going to take a shower, too?"

To this I shook my head and closed my English folder. "No, I'm going to the laundry room. It's time for us to work, remember?"

He frowned at me and shook his head. "I'm too tired, Mattie. Let's skip today."

"You can skip today," I said firmly as I pulled on my shoes and began to tie them. "We … need to work, remember? I'll work tonight by myself, you can make it up to me later." Then I grimaced and looked at his ruined clothes. "Eh, on second thought, why don't you make it up to me by letting me clean your clothes with the other loads? That way I won't have to smell them near our beds the rest of the night."

"Deal."

Al removed the articles, flung them carelessly toward me, and headed toward the shower with a basket of his necessities and a towel haphazardly hanging from his hips.

I rolled my eyes and threw his clothes into the nearby basket I was about to take down with me for my shift.

It wasn't until I was ready to head out the door that I noticed the wary look that Eduard was giving me. It gave me chills and I turned to face him.

"Something the matter?" I asked.

"You shouldn't go anywhere by yourself, Matt," he said, his voice softening as his gaze moved to Toris' unoccupied bed. "Toris still hasn't told the teachers who beat him up. And he says that people shouldn't go anywhere alone. It's starting to creep me out."

I gave him the best smile I could. "Thanks, Eduard, but I'm just doing laundry. I've been down there a thousand times already. I'll be fine."

And so, without a second thought, I left.

* * *

The securities we allow ourselves as children and the knowledge we have as adults are both necessary to keep us sane in our worst moments.

They're both also impossible to have at the same time.

That is, they're impossible to have at the same time except for in those precious years as you wane away your adolescence with the eager concept of becoming a teenager. You understand things that happen to you and to those around you, but you are still afforded the chance to be a child with childish thoughts and guards in your mind.

It's why when anyone forces you to forfeit time, that crime is of the most heinous in my mind.

* * *

When I went to the laundry room, the world before me was set out in meaningless chores and tasks.

It was a bit lonely, the first time I had a work shift without my brother, but it wasn't scary. Al was the one who would mistake the churning of the eighth dryer for a monster's bellows or a ghost's jingling chains. Not me.

While Al fancied himself a detective, even he would have a hard time refuting the idea that it was _me_ who was the more practical one.

Only one load completely finished, I began to fold the freshly dried clothes with bemused satisfaction. Until there was a familiar hollow bang and I turned in time to see clothes fall through the laundry shoot and into a newly emptied basket.

"Seriously?" I had asked and cursed my misfortune.

The washing machines and the dryers both had quite a while before they would be done with their respective tasks so I continued on with my folding.

In the loneliness of the basement, I recalled Alfred's explosion in Mr. Kirkland's class and began to laugh. The situation was much funnier after the horror of the moment had passed.

Then I allowed my mind to contemplate all the new ideas that Mr. Kirkland's slandering of the church had brought up.

These were questions I had never conceived before and, in my developing mind, they were fascinating. They brought into question everything I had ever known.

When I heard someone coming down the stairs, I was startled. In the back of my mind I hoped it was my brother, having felt guilty for not working the shift with me.

After the person in the door turned out to be Vash, I was both disappointed and disturbed.

He had never checked on me doing laundry before.

"Are you alright down here?" Vash asked.

My stomach began to feel very cold. A nervousness worked itself through my system and I remembered Eduard's words of cautions and Alfred's suspicions of our Hall Brother. They worked themselves over again and again until I felt like I was twisted into a knot.

"Fine," I squeaked.

"Your brother told me you would be late because he wasn't working with you tonight," Vash explained before turning to go upstairs. "I understand if you two want money, but don't forget you need sleep, alright?"

I blinked and nodded wordlessly. Then I watched him go back upstairs and I sighed with relief.

Returning to folding, I muttered to myself about how I'd kick Al's ass for sending our Hall Brother to check up on me. The dummy should have come for himself.

* * *

The time that passed before I heard another pair of footsteps is the most detailed memory I have of that night. I could recreate it perfectly if I wanted to.

The second and third loads were folded neatly and I had, at last, begun to empty out the baskets until I could happily begin turning off the finished machines for the night. I folded, doing my best to remember what sheets and towels went on which floor, guessing on a few because it wasn't like it mattered. Everything was the same stale white color and starchy texture.

I remember the smells of the fresh detergent and the feel of the fabric between my nimble fingers.

I recall the relaxing feeling of almost being done with my work. I remember how tempting thoughts of finally getting into bed after a long day were.

Then, of course, there was the sound of someone filing down the narrow stairs of the basement.

My heart had seized at first, suspecting it to once again be my Hall Brother, when I relaxed. It was the familiar face of the round faced guard Al and I had met. I still hadn't talked to him much but he was a security guard.

Unlike Vash, he had a reason to patrol every floor of the building. As did the guy behind him, who also wore a security uniform.

In my mind, I knew I had seen the second guard somewhere before, but couldn't recall where. Instead of letting it bother me, I looked to the more familiar guard. I still didn't know his name.

He looked me over and then placed his hands on the taunt belt loops of his pants. "Well, guess there's no intruders here," he said in a charming way.

"No," I said with a small smile before folding.

"Are you working alone?" he asked as his friend walked over to one of the working washing machines and gave a little hop to end up sitting on it.

"Just for tonight," I said with a wave of my hand. "My brother was tired."

I turned and placed the folded sheets into the second floor basket. Then I turned back to the mass of freshly dried white towels and sheets.

Knowing the way police were, I half expected to hear a 'Carry on, son,' and that be the end of my encounter.

When I turned around, the two of them were still there. I must have scowled slightly or given them a funny look because they looked at each other with knowing grins.

"I think I remember you," said the guard with the round face. He was gradually becoming more and more grotesque in my mind and the hairs on the back of my neck were starting to rise. "You're one of the _muscle_ guys."

Faintly, I recalled the first night Al and I had showered and seen the guard. I didn't really have a response to his comment, though.

He grinned toothily at me. "You and your brother, I've been watching you on campus. You look just alike."

I looked to my current sheet and noticed I had been folding it in triangles. There was no real reason for it, but I was nervously shaking like a leaf. Something wasn't right.

In spite of my usual quirk of correcting people for thinking my brother and I looked alike, to the guard I just said "We're twins."

"Twins?" said the one from the machines. It was the first word he had said to me. He had a long, thin smile that looked like the jester on a deck of cards. "That's kind of _kinky."_

This brought me back to looking at them. "Kinky?" I repeated. "What's that?"

They laughed but didn't answer. I still couldn't fold the sheets correctly.

Laying down the miserable folds I began to feel the racing of my heart and the pang in my chest that was telling me it was time to get the hell out of there.

I walked over to the last finished dryer with the intentions of taking out what was in them and put them in the cleaned pile for the morning's shift. I reached for the knob on the front of the machine.

A fat, flabby hand smashed down on mine, stubbing my thumb and a few of my fingers against the metal surface of the dryer. It hurt and I let out a squeak of surprise.

"What!" I cried out as I attempted to turn only to feel a second fat hand wrap around my mouth, shoving its sausage like fingers down into my mouth until I was gagging.

Everything happened so fast I could barely register it.

I was being held against the fat tub of the guard's abdomen as his friend, all shits and giggles, worked the latch of my pants. My skin went cold and my brain seemed to almost shut off. I struggle and tried to kick at the fucker and bite the fat one's fingers.

It was a serious miscalculation on my part. The response was to knee me so hard in my stomach that I blacked out for a moment or two.

When the lights came back on I was no longer in my clothes and I was trembling before _three _guards. My mind was reeling as I realized that not one of them was the fat man. Everything was so fuzzy but in my mind, I knew I had to find where the fat one was.

After I realized where he was, it was too late to think of grabbing my things and leaving, he had me by my shoulders and forced me down on my knees, kicking the heel of his boot into the curve of my legs. He was just so damn strong!

"We're going to play a game," said the fat man into my ear. His breath felt like a furnace on my neck and I shuddered. It was so cold but I didn't want warmth from his fat lips. "I'm going to ask you a question, if you can answer it, we'll give you one of your clothes back."

I blinked and then looked to the others. They were all waiting for something it seemed.

"If you get it wrong," the fat one continued, I felt him grab my ass, "we get to have fun."

The only thing I knew was that I did not want to find out what their idea of fun was.

When I didn't answer, he must have taken it as an agreement. Rather suddenly, he held a coin before my eyes, I gasped.

"What's this?" he asked.

My arms were quaking. "Sss-saint M-Michael, p-protector of th-the police," I muttered. "M-m-my brother-brother's c-c-coin."

I suddenly felt something alien inside my body. It burned and I screamed and screamed as I went cross eyed with the pain.

"No, it's _my _coin now."

* * *

The night is fuzzy. I recall the smell of starch as my head was forced into the piles of laundry and how the flaps of disgusting folds of skin on my body felt.

I remember laying there in shock as the guards traded off and the process began all over again.

I remember being numb, feeling only like some creature had crawled into the pit of my stomach and killed the child that had once been in there.

As I laid there I would watch the fat one flip my brother's precious coin like a common quarter, smiling at it with complete content.

* * *

Getting to the room was a blur. And I didn't care enough to save the memory in my mind.

All I knew was that I hurt from head to toe. My brother was in my bed.

Enraged, I shoved him off the bed, not caring that his startled cry would wake up Eduard and Toris.

I curled into my blankets and hid my head from the world, ignoring Al's ravings, then his concerned questions, then his gentle shaking.

"What's the matter, Mattie?"

Mattie was dead, Al. Just call me Matthew.

* * *

[Notes]  
*At this time, Babe Ruth's records had not been broken yet. He was undeniably the greatest baseball player of all time (for the time period).  
*_ tėvas _is Lithuanian for "father"  
*1692 – Salem Witch Trials. Arthur refers to them as a "genocide" of the witches.

_I … don't really have much to say. _

_Please Review  
~Right_


	9. Chapter Eight: Falling Apart

_Thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_, _**Semetastic**_, and _**lilredd3394**_ for your reviews!_

_**WARNING: THIS CHAPTER DOES CONTAIN ALLUSIONS TO UNDER AGED RAPE.**  
_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Switzerland, Lithuania, Estonia, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, **Child Abuse**, **Rape**, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Eight: Falling Apart

My brother's urgings for me to talk or, in the very least, remove my face from the covers enough to look at him went on into the morning. Past when Eduard begged Al to hush so that he could go to sleep.

He sat on the edge of my bed a few times only for me to kick him off.

I was sick of him taking up my space! I wanted him to go back to sleep and leave me alone, let me rot in my personal Hell. I couldn't face the much worse realities the world had to offer. I had seen and heard and felt too much that night.

My young body was spent. I felt ashamed and disgusting and dirty and _rotted. _In my mind's eye I was no better than a nasty, gutted brood cow out on the farm; opened wide up for the world to see and for the flies to pester.

Even that would be too full to describe how I felt, though.

I was sick. I wanted to throw up but I knew that if I did that I would see what I had swallowed earlier.

That was something my mind would not be able to withstand.

Al had sat on my bed for what must have been the tenth time. I allowed it.

He attempted to rub my back in tiny circles around my shoulder blades as he whispered to me. It was the sort of thing Mom did when I was sick with fever.

It was also what the second guard—five foot three, medium shoulders, brown hair and green eyes, he was 24, his name was Gene Barker, he was wearing a wedding ring—did when I broke down. Then he smacked me over the head and fucked me into the floor.

I kicked Al so hard off the bed that I heard his forehead meet the wall.

* * *

By the time Eduard's alarm went off and our roommates began to get ready for classes, Al had resolved to returning the silent treatment to me. He had also resolved to pulling his desk chair up to the bed and sitting in it. I only knew because the damn _starched _sheets were thin enough for me to see through them.

Everyone was silent and I would have closed my eyes if I had the brain capacity to.

I was shut down. I merely watched the world move on without me, observing but not partaking as my friends continued on with their daily routines, happy as could be, even if they weren't wearing smiles and kept shooting concerned looks in my direction.

It didn't matter if they weren't happy just then. They would be allowed to be happy soon enough.

I thought _you bastards. Why am I having to go through this? Why can't I be getting ready for school?_

Eduard asked if I would be going to classes.

"He's sick," Al said with a ferocity that could only be attributed to his lack of sleep. "No. And neither am I."

I wanted to start crying. _Leave me the fuck alone, Al!_

Toris muttered something that was all but blocked by my sheets. I watched him suspiciously from behind the white lenins and mused at how Eduard gathered his things and went on to breakfast. He kept to himself and his own problems. I never respected him more for that. I also never resented him more for that.

Whatever Toris had said to Al probably had to do with a bathroom break because my brother fidgeted with his boxers and then nodded before patting me on the shoulder.

I tensed.

He had paused to say something to me before I had reacted, but the words never came. He released his hold and went out the door. Toris locked it behind him and I felt my heart sank.

I couldn't handle anymore, I almost began to choke on the sobs that had hidden themselves in my throat when I heard fabric moving in the distance.

Toris took off all his sheets and carried them over to my bed, he lifted the blanket off of me with a gentle ease and frowned. He then began to untuck the edges of my bed.

There was no energy in my body to protest or question him.

He then traded his sheets and such for mine, ignoring my brother's screams and banging on the door. I then watched as Toris, without a word, gathered up the sheets that had once been in my care. It was the first time I realized they were stained a disgusting red.

"I'm so sorry," Toris said to me before throwing them in the laundry bag and opening the door to my brother who fell forward from a botched attempt to ram the door with his shoulder.

* * *

"Do you want to take a shower?"

It was noon. I felt like I was buried in my own filth and the filth of the men who never left my wide open vision no matter how blank my mind would get.

I looked to my brother and nodded.

He looked relieved for the first time since this mess had started.

* * *

"I can't walk."

It was the first thing I had said since we had parted ways the night before. My voice was torn and scratchy. The simplest of noises that came from it caused tears to well in my eyes. I kept imagining what was done to it and my mouth the night before.

Al stared at me. His jaw and fists tightly clenched.

"What happened?"

That was when I lost all control of myself.

I would say I became a puddle of tears at that point, but I had been that since my head hit the bed at three that morning. The difference was that I had lost my weak front that had hidden it so well.

* * *

Alfred had pulled his desk chair across the hall and into the shower stalls.

He had tried to throw my arm around his shoulders and support my weight as I walked myself to the showers, but he and I both found that my legs had no feeling still. My feet lamely curled and twisted beneath my legs without finding footing.

This horrified my twin much more than it did me.

That was how he came to the point that he cradled me in his arms as he carried me to the showers. I asked myself inwardly how long Al had been building up this extra strength, but then I shushed the thought away.

"I'm not taking your clothes off," he told me firmly as he sat me on the chair situated beneath a shower head.

I didn't respond.

He didn't move.

"What are you waiting for, you bastard?" I hissed.

He raised his brows at my statement. I never cussed. Not much. Not to him. Not _at_ him.

"My brother to show up," he snapped. I had to give my brother props. He wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, but give him an opening and he'll come up with a fantastic zinger.

We stayed that way, dead locked, for what felt like an eternity before the itching of my skin became too much.

I had to get clean. I had to wash the night away and I just _knew_ that if I could watch the nasty memories wash into the drain like skin flakes then I would be okay. Everything would be okay again.

Ignoring Alfred, I removed my shirt shakily. My muscles protested every turn, every move. By the time my pants were at my ankles, I heard some sort of choking sound.

That was when I looked to see Al red as a beat. His blue eyes were pin pricks in wide, white oceans as he stared at my body. I felt over exposed, gross. I wanted to throw up I was so filled to the brim with unexplainable anxiety.

"What the _fuck_ happened to you!" he demanded, and I realized he was crying.

Biting my lip, I looked at my legs, at my belly and arms. I realized they were purple and black, swollen, dotted with splattered, dry red. I looked like the canvas of a demented artist. It made my chest clench and I couldn't breathe.

Then I cried. Because I realized that the water wasn't going to do much about washing it all away. And that was devastating.

* * *

The tenderness my brother took in gracing a wet wash cloth over my battered body was unprecedented.

For as long as I had known Al, which was basically since the womb, he had been nothing but two modes: abrasive and aggressive.

As he helped clean me while I sat there like a blubbering idiot, trapped in my own thoughts, he was utterly silent. That was something else that was completely out of character for him and it was beginning to worry me.

I wanted to push him away. My chest burned with the desire to just kick him with all the little reserved strength I had and tell him to just leave me alone in the shower stall.

But, despite my efforts, I couldn't do it. We were tied by some natural force. In my mind I realized that somehow the furthest possible option from the sick touches of my rapists were the gentle embraces of my only real family.

Grandma Jonesie wasn't around, not that I would feel like I could go to her if she was. Father Antonio had a line at which point it wasn't so much a part of our family as I had always _wished _he had been.

All I had was Al.

But even though I had stopped kicking him into walls, I felt like I was building some shield between us. It was a small one, but it was a barrier that had never been there before. It worried me. I both needed it and wished to escape it.

* * *

When he finished bathing me, his own clothes sticking wetly to his body and probably ruined, Alfred helped dry me and then began to lift me up to stand. Some of my legs' feeling had returned.

"I want you to mark my words," Al said with a hiss not intended for me. "I will find out who did this to you. And I _will _kill them."

I never responded.

But I knew I couldn't let that happen. There were too many of them. They were too strong. They were the fucking security guards. Al was just going to get himself hurt.

It was an option I swore to myself I would _never_ allow happen.

* * *

The day after was Saturday. Al brought me pancakes from the kitchen. He had even snuck a bottle of syrup up in his pocket so I could dress them myself.

I wasn't hungry, though.

He sat it down on the table with the untouched stake from the night before.

Al then laid out on the floor by my bed and took a nap. It was where he had slept last night.

* * *

"If he's too sick to go to classes or service then it's time to get a doctor," Eduard told Al after my brother informed him we wouldn't be going to mass.

"He doesn't want one," Al said simply. "We've never gone to one before. Why start now?"

Toris stared at me as I sat on the bed. I hated whatever look he was giving me. I wasn't stupid. I realized, with quite some horror, that the look he gave me was empathetic.

It was no longer a mystery to me what had exactly happened to Toris all those many weeks before.

My only question was why what happened _beyond_ the beatings had been kept so secret.

* * *

"If you don't tell me who did it, I'll find out," Al said firmly as he prepared to skip classes for the second time on my behalf. "And when I find out, I'll make them hurt so bad they'll _wish_ I would kill them."

"No, you won't," I said firmly as I finally ate some bacon.

"They can't hurt you without me being the consequence," Al said.

Then he said what he had been wanting to say since that Friday.

"I am so sorry, Mattie," he sobbed as he buried his face into his hands. "I promised I wouldn't let you get hurt. I promised you. I promised Grandma Jonesie. I promised _Dad."_

There was a desire in the pit of my stomach to reach out and tell him it wasn't his fault. To tell him what really happened.

But I couldn't tell him it wasn't his fault because my mind was still searching for it to be _someone's _fault and he kept making himself available for blame.

I also couldn't tell him because I couldn't put into words what had happened.

* * *

"Maybe you should write a journal," he suggested after Vash had chewed us out for an hour about skipping classes. "Make you feel better. Say! Have you written Grandma Jonesie and Father Antonio? I mean, not about those bastards beating you up. I mean just writing them. It always makes you feel better."

The concept was nice. The thought of doing it made me just about lose what I had passed as my breakfast.

"Okay, okay," Al said gently. "Well, we do have to write them soon. They'll get worried if we don't."

I stared at him.

He eventually caught on and shook his head. "I'm not any good at writing."

* * *

That was when he started writing our letters to Grandma Jonesie and Father Antonio. I never wrote either of them again.

* * *

Al pointed at a spot on my shoulder as we got dressed one morning.

"That one's still black," he said with a tinge of anger in his eyes.

I wasn't able to control my mind. It suddenly sped away to the memory of being pinned beneath the fat, flabby weight of the head guard. Of how his elastic cheeks flopped around on my skin as he tore into my body. And then I remembered the sensation of his fish lips curling around on my shoulder blade. How he sucked my skin and slobbered and licked it like it belonged to him. I remembered wanting to just die because I was no longer Matthew Jones but an extension of this disgusting, piggish man.

Al caught me as I nearly fell over my own feet. He never pointed out any of my injuries again. He just glared at anyone or any thing that dared to look my way with anything but the upmost, friendliest concern.

* * *

Years later we were at a bar in Quebec City, Al being pissy about how he didn't know French.

I asked him, because I was drunk and so was he, why he never told anybody that he thought I had been beat up by the mysterious 'bullies.'

He punched me so hard I thought he knocked a tooth out. After some apologies from both sides he answered me.

"I didn't know what the fuck happened to you," he said lowly. "I couldn't tell anyone if I didn't know anything. I can definitely tell you I never thought it was _that."_

We never did get any better at discussing the things that happened in St. Francis.

* * *

_A note about the security guards: I did not want to put any of the characters (who I all love) in this position and so I did 'cheat' and have instead based these characters on some of the less famous historical "villains" in the world. The main guard is the one from the Prologue, and yes there will be much more of him in the future, I'm loathed to say. Again, this does have a purpose. Please keep in mind the time period because it does explain how so much of these horrendous acts go largely unrecognized.  
_

_Please Review  
~Right_


	10. Chapter Nine: Guarding

_Thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_ for the reviews!_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Switzerland, Lithuania, Estonia, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, **Religious Overtones**, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide**  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Nine: Guarding

I sank into myself and disappeared. It was as if I had taken every comment about how I was the quieter, less noticeable twin and grew it into my only trait.

That was good, though.

It had somehow occurred to my cloudy, rebounding mind that the only way to make it like the events of that night did not happen would be to make it like I had never existed to experience them.

When I did that, when it became obvious that every person around me was locked out of my personal fortress, they stopped spreading their concern and understanding.

Instead it was going to Al. Alfred who thought that the only way to make up for my absence of mind was to rave and shout and make an ass of himself to anyone who could be a suspect to my attack. And everyone was a suspect for my attack.

Something I would not be able to appreciate until many years later was how my brother clung on to my old self harder than I did. He would not let his Mattie die. And as long as he did that, a small child inside my mind curled into his comforting words and warm embraces with defiance. It was not going to let me drop it completely just yet, even if my body rejected it with all my might.

One constant I could appreciate for what it was at the time, though, was Gilbert Beilschmidt.

* * *

"What, he still sick? He looks almost as white as me!"

Alfred, when he was upset for my lack of responses on any one day, had taken up the nasty habit of discussing me with others like I wasn't there. I could at least tell he knew better, though, because his gaze continuously met mine as he did it. Then he would quickly look away as if he was guilty.

"He won't hardly get out of the room s'why," my brother responded sourly to Gilbert before setting sights on me. "You've got to stop this, Matt. It's driving me crazy."

I rolled my eyes and held my knees closer to my chest as I sat on the Bonnefoy Hall stoop. Al could try all he wanted, he was not about to get anything else out of me. It was my secret. It was my cross to bear.

"C'mon, then," Gilbert said, as if there had been another conversation beneath the surface. He turned and began walking.

The two of us followed like we were dragged by a dog's chain.

* * *

I watched my reflection in the river below the bridge. I looked sad and alien. It didn't seem like my body or my face or my sad, sad eyes at all. It all seemed rather stilted.

Gilbert leaned farther over the rail, as if he was going to balance himself on his abs, which would be dangerous and completely in character for him to do.

It occurred to me that I should warn him about the chance of losing his prescription sunglasses, something I wasn't even aware _existed _at the time, when I thought better of it.

There was still a lump in my throat that seemed determined to keep me from talking to anyone over anything. All people became security guards. All subjects became the one I was avoiding.

"I don't want you to talk to me," Gilbert said with a strange omnipotence in his voice. He didn't even bother looking at me. "Don't get me wrong, I'm here for you if that's what you really want, but I can promise you this, if you don't talk to your brother and he eventually gives up trying to talk to you, you'll regret it for the rest of your life."

My mouth felt dry.

"I don't want to talk about … getting beat up," I said finally.

"I don't give a fuck," he said truthfully. "Don't. Talk about cows, for christsake. Anything will be better than saying nothing. Because when you say nothing, it tells you brother that _he's _the problem."

There was a long quiet after that. Neither of us looked at each other or spoke again until Al walked out of the barber shop. Then all I said to Gilbert in the quiet moments as Alfred skipped toward us was "thanks."

* * *

Officially November and approaching the chaotic time period that involved the last of the fall harvests, Thanksgiving break, final exams, and the long awaited Christmas break which brought, of course, Christmas.

I should not have been so surprised when Al stopped in front of a jewelry store as we walked through town with Gilbert and pointed at a ring with a garnet on it so small it could only be considered a fleck of reddened rock.

"That's perfect!" he decided out loud. "We have to raise enough money before Christmas to get that for Grandma Jonesie!"

I stared at the birthstone and felt a cold emptiness in my stomach.

* * *

Al did not bring up the ring again for the next few days and I clung to the false hope that he had come to his senses and we could instead use the money we had already saved up to buy something smaller and less expensive for Grandma Jonesie.

Instead, I thought about the advice Gilbert had given me.

He had been right. It wouldn't matter what I talked to Alfred about so long as I assured him I wanted to talk to him, told him that he wasn't the problem.

Because he wasn't. He was what was keeping me afloat.

The thought of telling him the _truth _graced my mind only once before I chased it away.

No, I wasn't to that point yet.

But I would talk to him. I had resolved to it.

I left the room to find him, he had gone to the bathroom just a while earlier. But before I walked to the bathroom I noticed some of the other boys in the hall surrounding Vash's door.

It was time to sign up for the work schedule.

There was a strange sixth sense which gnawed on the back of my mind. I gritted my teeth and said, "No."

By the time I got to the door I was the only one there and I could see very clearly.

LAUNDRY ROOM – NIGHT SHIFT  
Alfred F. Jones*

* * *

I wanted to scream. I felt hot tears stinging my eyes, blinding me as I knotted my hands in my hair. He was such an idiot! Had he not noticed that I refused to go down there? Had he not realized yet that the place was _evil?_

Lost in my mental collapse, I didn't notice anyone around me until someone grabbed my shoulder.

"Mattie?"

I whirled around and punched Alfred in the nose, just as hard as I could. I was just so pissed at him and my mind continuously replayed that night. Over and over. Over and over. Why couldn't he let me forget it? Why did he keep bringing it up.

The recourse for my actions did not hit my foggy mind until after I watched my brother's head slam into one of our neighbors' door, his nose already spewing snotty blood.

People were standing in utter shock. I stared at my bloody fist.

Wobbly, Al found his footing and glared at me. I had crossed the line. I didn't even bother defending myself.

"Whaf. De. 'Ell?" he snarled, which was a whole lot less impressive with a broken nose.

I swallowed and then pointed at the work sheet. He followed my finger with an absolutely lost look contorted on his features. I then swallowed and glared even more intensely at him.

All the anger I had bottled up was coming out and it was too late to stop it.

"You don't think to ask me about _anything!_ Are you really that stupid to sign up for that shift? For that _job_ after this happened to me? You're inconsiderate and stupid! You should be doing your work instead of having to copy Eduard and me! And, y'know why you get away with it? You get away with it because you don't care about anyone else! _You're just like Dad!"_

My brother's eyes were wide and white.

I felt about ready to throw up. I couldn't believe what I had just said. I had gone too far, but the hurt and pain in the pit of my stomach kept humming _not far enough._

My lip began to tremble as I waited for my brother's shock to wear off, for him to process the insults. I chewed on it at first and then I reached for him. "A-Alfred, look—"

He screamed out like an animal and then tackled me to the ground. I brought my arms up in defense as he swung at me with his bony fists. He was screaming something at me that came to my mind only in bits and pieces.

"Mom lef'—Bas'ard!—How coulf you—You won't 'ell me whaf—I hate you—You're s'posed t'be—Dad waf a hero—Fuck—Such bullshit—"

People were gathering around us and shouting, tugging on Alfred's shoulders to pull him off me. They began to warn about Vash finding us fighting. Someone reminded us about getting in trouble, and it began to dawn on me.

If Vash caught us, we would be in trouble tonight. We wouldn't be allowed to work. We might not get extra hours for the rest of the semester.

Al's swings had stopped in time to let me fling myself forward and begin pummeling my brother back. No one reached for me, more shocked that quiet, sensible Matthew was attacking the hotheaded twin.

He didn't raise his arms up in defense for a while, too shocked himself.

I heard a whistle but didn't stop until two fat, flabby hands grabbed my arms and yanked me off my brother. I didn't have to look for my breath to hitch. Every inch of that man was cataloged in my brain to my everlasting horror.

There was a pause of silence and I could pick out Toris in the crowd. He looked about ready to throw up.

I felt my legs go limp and I just began to bawl as a second and third guard grabbed my brother's arms and held him up.

No, this wasn't what I wanted at all.

* * *

My brother was fuming. He wouldn't even look at me as we were led down the stairs, across the campus, and into the musky smelling office for the security guards.

I couldn't stop crying. Even when my tears had dried up from my sockets, I hiccuped every breath I took.

We were sat down in chairs next to one another and for whatever reason I could only manage to do what I was told.

I kept telling myself this had to be a nightmare, because God could not be so cruel.

When my hopes dried up like a feigning prayer, I realized that the fat one was the one who sat at the chief's desk. I realized it was him who the nametag _Meager Tweed_ belonged to. I realized it was my father's coin that was between his sausage link fingers. I realized that those were mine and Al's classified files laid out on the desk.

"You boys don't have anywhere else to go," he said, not questioning.

This made Al and myself balk, though I didn't dare talk.

"We haff Grammie 'Onsie," Al moaned without any assistance from his nose. He grabbed a tissue from the box offered to him and spat up some of the blood that had been leaking down into his throat.

"I sent a letter to your Grandma Jonesie a few weeks ago," he said knowingly. I felt my heart sink. "Looks like she was evicted."

Al and I grew very silent. I began twitching and sobbing and my entire jaw tightened protectively over my mouth.

None of this went unnoticed by my brother. He glanced to Tweed's hand.

"Mah' dad had uh' coin like dat," Al said lowly. "It's s'posed t'be fo' only _real _cops."

This caused Tweed to bristle along with the other guards there. They looked at each other and then to us.

I couldn't contain it anymore. I fell to my knees, grabbing the nearby waste basket, and retched. Sobbing all the way.

"You beat'uh mah' brot'er!" Alfred roared, raising to his feet.

"We did no such thing," the guard said with a warning gaze that then became sharp, dangerous. "But we can show you what we did to him."

I was grabbed by the collar of my shirt and I realized that I had to get Al away from them. I wiggled free of my shirt, grabbed my brother's wrist and yanked him toward the door with me. I knew we had to get away from there, from them, from anyone or thing that could ever drag us back, physically or mentally.

That was when I knew it was my last chance to not only save my brother but also myself.

I felt a new sense of responsibility just before an elbow was brought down on my neck. I heard my brother yelp and I just knew that I would never forgive myself for what was about to happen.

* * *

Living at St. Francis. Working at St. Francis. Going to school at St. Francis. Sometimes it was easy to forget that the buildings and chapels had all originally been created for the nuns that still frequented the Lamar Hall dormitories.

These thoughts were only truly present when we were studying in the library or visiting confessional at a time when the nuns were praying.

Some of the older teachers also happened to be nuns, as most of the staff used to be before St. Francis began to modify its image.

The school was supposed to be a beacon of utter participation between finer education and religious tradition.

It was the only reason that skeptical sorts like Mr. Kirkland were allowed to teach. Because somewhere along the line, St. Francis stopped looking for what would be the most _Catholic _thing to do and began looking for what would be the best investment.

Like a music teacher who couldn't speak in public but _had _performed in several well known orchestras.

Like a Soviet Union immigrant who may not speak much English but _would_ take on the task of managing the entire school farm for minimum wage.

Like an atheist English teacher who was a nasty drunk but _did_ have the reputation of an Oxford graduate.

Like a head security guard who was a convicted child rapist but _didn't _have records in the state of New York so he was completely safe to hire. Along with his friends and cousin.

* * *

My heart dared to raise slightly as we were frog marched past the stairwell to the laundry room.

I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't the Employees Only door which happened to lead to another part of the basement. One that reminded me that this had been an interconnected convent built between World Wars.

It began to make sense how the older boys were always getting in trouble for sneaking peeks at the Lamar girls as we were marched through the underground hall with walls so thick that no one would hear us screaming.

* * *

_Sorry about the random updates, but I'm working on a few other projects at the same time as this one. Feel free to check out some of the other stories on this account *so shameless about plugs*_

_Please Review  
~Right_

_p.s. Francis does appear later in this story. I promise naming the boy's hall after him was not just a cruel allusion.  
_


	11. Chapter Ten: Breaking Point

_Thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_ I can't thank you enough for your support of this story!_

_**WARNING: THIS CHAPTER DOES CONTAIN UNDER AGED RAPE**  
_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, Switzerland, Lithuania, Estonia, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, **Child Abuse, Rape,** Swearing, **Violence, Mentions of Suicide****  
Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Ten: Breaking Point

I remember the times when I was a much younger child with foggy reverence. There was a time when I did not hate my father or pity my mother. When Grandma Jonesie's house was somewhere to have sleepovers and eat cake. When I used to curl up with my brother on the couch in fruitless attempts to stay up past our bedtimes.

I remember how Al had this genuine smile when the sheriff in the Westerns used to stop the villains with little more than a shine of his badge and a quick release of the trigger.

That was how justice was served. Immediate and satisfying, like the pull of something as simple as a tiny lever.

This brother, this happy simple child, is what I miss more than anything. The one that could point his index finger at me, squint one eye closed, and say BANG to make any of my demons go away.

Sometimes I forget he ever really existed outside of anything but my imagination.

* * *

"LE' GO O' ME LE' GO O' ME LE' GO O' ME – LE' GO O' MAH BRO'DER LE' GO O' MATTIE – SONS O' BI'CHES SONS O'—"

I couldn't feel a thing as we stopped at the end of one long corridor, a former bomb shelter for the nuns.

Instead my mind shifted gears between watching my brother struggle against our captors and gazing around the small hall. I was particularly interested in the small indent in the wall and the painting of Mary which stood watching.

Then I snapped back into reality after I saw my brother bite one of the guards' wrists so hard that he brought blood.

It all came rushing back to me, so fast I felt the wind knocked out of me. I knew what was going to happen, and I was _not _about to let it happen to my brother. I summoned all the strength in my body to my fist and punched the one holding my shoulders real good in the balls. He fell over like a sack of potatoes.

My body began to feel again, the adrenaline coursing through my veins. I felt like I was still alive when I fought like an animal to save the innocence he kept for the both of us.

There was an ear deafening bang and I whirled around to see a gun in the hands of Meager Tweed. My heart seized and I glanced to my brother who looked equal parts shocked and enraged. He had no idea what was going on, and that much was my fault.

"Calm the fuck down, kiddies," the guard said calmly. He then looked at Al's tight lipped expression. "And yes. This is a bomb shelter. No one would've heard that.

Alfred said nothing because he didn't have to. Not with it written all over his face like it was.

This amused Tweed because he sat on his haunches right in front of Alfred, as if taunting him for his current ineptness.

"Now, listen here, you little bitch," Tweed said lowly, just loud enough for me to overhear. "I don't have any problem with burying a bullet right between your eyes, so don't you tempt me, understand?"

Alfred glared, meeting the man's eyes with his own. He had no fear.

Then Tweed pointed the gun at me. My breath hitched.

"Or, since you two look _so _much alike, I might just make a mistake and put it between _his _eyes." Al flinched. "Got it?"

There was a moment where Alfred stared at me and I looked helplessly back at him. I honestly would have rather he kicked the guy in the shins and ran away from there as fast as he could. Let them end my life right then before I had to witness any more.

But he wouldn't dare. And if I had been him, I wouldn't have dared either.

My brother looked angrily but still even to Tweed.

"Take off your clothes," Tweed said without missing a beat.

Alfred stared at him, utterly silent.

"What's the matter, muscles?" he said sweetly, causing the other guards to laugh. Then, a little harsher, "Take them off."

When my shocked brother didn't move fast enough, Tweed lunged forward, hooking two fingers into the nostrils of my brother's already badly broken nose. Al let out a painful yell which only increased in volume as the guard twisted his fingers into the bloody nose and lifted Al up by the hold.

I just about lost it and began to run forward when I felt the guard behind me grab onto the elastic of my pants and throw me down to the ground. He twisted my arms behind my back and forced them down as he buried his knee into the dip of my spine.

For a few moments I struggled but gave up as I heard the ripping of clothes and looked up in time see Al bucking and screaming a slew of profanities as he had his pants ripped off of him.

* * *

The floor was hard and cold and unforgiving.

"What are you doing? Stop! S-Stop! MATT! MATTIE! I-I STOP!"

I just sat there, my chin biting into my cheeks so hard my mouth was awash with my own blood. I could feel myself shaking with sobs as I watched, unable to look away.

Alfred looked like his guts were being ripped out of him as he laid there, naked and on his back on the cold cement. He screamed and cussed and shook from head to toe as Tweed carelessly raped him. I couldn't take that image alone, but Al just wouldn't _stop. _He couldn't stop screaming my name as they raped him and I couldn't do a damn thing.

"MATT! OH, GOD! MATTIE! PLEASE! MATT!"

My eyes blurred and I just _prayed_ to this God that Al kept calling to, that Mary stood in place for, would either strike down our attackers now or smite my brother. Kill him now before he can think clearly abut what was happening to him, to me, and let it destroy the person he was in my mind.

I wanted my brother to be dead rather than suffer that along with me.

Al screamed again and attempted to buck which only got him punched in the nose by Tweed's fat, flabby fist.

When Al went silent, I felt cold, numb, until I heard him cry. It wasn't a painful howl or prelude to an onslaught of cusses and screams.

He just sobbed and laid his head back. I could see the tears rolling down his cheeks.

"Dad! Daddy, please!" he moaned. "S-save me, D-Daddy!"

The guards laughed and I closed my eyes as tight as I could. I wasn't going to be able to watch anymore. I was already past the point of throwing up. Al had no way of knowing that this was just the first. And I couldn't find the words to tell him.

* * *

When the guards couldn't wait for my brother they took pleasure in the fact that they had an identical twin in the room with them.

I just watched my brother no matter what was happening to me. He was still fighting, but it was not the child fighting for innocence anymore.

He had a dead luster in his eyes. His lack of words and useless thrashes made it all the more clear that he was a caged animal needing to be released than a boy who was forcibly attacked and assaulted.

I began to have fantasies where the sheriff would come rushing into the room. Shoot and ask questions never. Kill every single guard in the room.

And maybe me. Because I didn't know if I wanted to go on any longer anyway.

* * *

In the laundry room I had my clothes still and the visible memories were those on the bloody sheets I had shoved into the wash before I left. No one was to know. I could never let anyone know.

I found out later that Al and I had been left in the forgotten corridors sometime early in the morning, before the sun would rise. They had kept us down there for hours and hours.

There was an even larger lapse of time as I sat, knees to my chest, and watched over Alfred.

He was discarded and disrobed, shreds of clothing wrapped around his body which was bloody, bruised, and hickey covered. He had two black eyes and a broken nose. I always figured his right pinky had been broken as well because it was swollen and never did straighten out again.

For the first hour or so he had cried, curled up into himself on the floor. After that he was silent. After that he was asleep.

Then, like a willowy draft making its way through the corridor, I heard, "I hate you."

My heart sunk and I looked away. In the corner of my eye, however, I could see my brother's arm moving. Intrigued, I silently made my way to him.

"A-Al?" I asked, my throat still raw and voice broken.

He didn't answer, just continued to move his arm as he wrote in his own blood the names of our assailants.

Peter Sweeny  
John Hoffman  
Gene Barker  
Magear Tweed

* * *

When I knew no one would be in Bonnefoy, during class hours, I finally used my shirt to wrap around my brother's bare waist.

He didn't protest, like a large doll he allowed me to dress him and coo at him, saying false promises about how everything would be alright. He never even looked at me.

But I didn't want him to look at me. I wouldn't have been capable of handling him looking at me. His eyes were dead and soulless. He was no more the Alfred I knew than I was. He could never go back to that place and I wasn't ready to handle that. Not then.

I wrapped his arm around my shoulders and hoisted him up.

As soon as he got to his feet, Alfred shoved off of me in favor of the wall. He rubbed his forehead into the cement, as if wishing it would consume him.

We were silent for a while and then I moved to help him walk again. He didn't protest for the rest of the long walk to our room.

* * *

"I'm going to history," he told me as I dressed his wounds.

"I don't think you should," I told him quietly, not understanding how he could even talk to me. "We should get you to a doctor."

There was no time to react before Alfred had pinned me to the floor, his forearm flat against my throat as he looked me in the eyes. His eyes didn't seem blue, they seemed wide and black like an attacking shark. It looked dangerous and broken.

"Why didn't you tell me!" he demanded.

It was a question there was no real answer for. But I knew that whatever my intentions were, they weren't for this to happen. Not to anyone. Not to me. Most of all, not to him.

Instead, I opted to ask, "Are you going to tell anyone?"

He loosened his grip and buried his face into my shoulder, sobbing into my skin and no doubt covering it in his flaking dried blood.

I didn't care, though. I hugged him as tightly against me as possible, running my fingers soothingly through the rolling waves of his hair.

"D-don't tell Grandma," he whispered to me.

"Never," I answered.

"D-don't tell Father Antonio," he pressed.

"Never."

"O-only u-u-us?"

I nodded and, for good measure, whispered, "Always."

* * *

The problem was, and I should have known it from the start, it could never remain between us.

What we felt, that pain, that loss of our self respect was only for us, between us. It was something we could only feel for as twins and as brothers that suffered through a tremendous pain together. It could never be felt by another, not even Toris who I would later explain to Al, yes, did in fact suffer the unusual cruelties from the guards.

But things were not right. They were far from it.

Keeping the facts away from anyone else in the universe had been possible when I was swallowed in my own pool of self hate.

It might have even been possible if Al had been more like me. But he wasn't.

His sense of justice was telling him that it needed to stop. The guards needed to be stopped. Someone needed revenge, if not for us then for _someone _the bastards had hurt nearly as much.

Alfred F. Jones kept his mouth closed because it was a promise. One to me, his brother, his twin.

He had already broken a promise to keep me safe from harm, an impossible promise really.

But it was killing him. Whatever was left of him.

It was also driving him insane.

* * *

The mood swings were defendable. The clinginess he had to me as well.

Even though the school officials had been told by the attending guards as well as several of the boys on our floor that it had been me to do the unthinkable damage to my brother's body, I was allowed to hold his hand as the visiting doctor popped his bloody, broken nose back into place.

The reason for this was that Alfred had dragged me along to do so in the first place. Headmaster Vargas as well as an overly concerned Mr. Kirkland were there and made their disapproval of the plan apparent.

When the nurse attempted to lead me away from the room, I gave Al a gentle, "I'll be right outside."

He responded by grabbing a syringe and moving to stab the poor woman.

Only Kirkland's quick motions not only stopped the horrendous but caused my brother to break down into a sobbing mess. Headmaster Vargas left the room, claiming he needed one of the priests to exorcize my brother.

"What were you thinking, Lad?" Mr. Kirkland soothed.

"I won't let anyone touch Mattie, ever!" he roared, his wild, blackened eyes centering on the woman who practically ran out into the hall in response.

I explained to the doctor some bullshit about my brother being delirious ever since the fight, feigning concern over the nose injury that I knew was only the surface of my twin's wounds. The doctor found this logical and never mentioned making me leave as he prepared to fix what he could of Al's nose.

So I held my brother's hand tightly, squeezing it and brushing my fingers over it.

Mr. Kirkland held the other.

I didn't notice until there was an agonizing pop and Alfred yelped. Then, like he always did when he was injured, his head whirled around to look for some comfort, only I found he did not look to me but to his left where Mr. Kirkland sat.

And so I began to wonder, why the hell was he even there?

* * *

Something truly ugly grew in the pit of my stomach that day.

I didn't trust Mr. Kirkland. Alfred adored him.

Mr. Kirkland was not very well liked by students or faculty. The students and faculty were not very well liked by Mr. Kirkland in return.

Yet he doted on Alfred.

They continued yelling and disagreeing with each other in class. But it always started and ended each class period the same.

"Good Morning, Mr. and Mr. Jones."

"Good Morning, Mr. Kirkland."

"Is Matthew going to speak to me today?"

"Maybe tomorrow, Mr. Kirkland."

"How are your cows?"

"Mooing, Mr. Kirkland."

Then, as we were the last ones leaving.

"I would like for you two to come over for tea later."

"Maybe some other time, Mr. Kirkland."

"Then perhaps you could tell me what's going on in here."

"Maybe some other time, Mr. Kirkland."

It was the only time Alfred was remotely like his old self. And I hated it.

It was a ghost, a shadow. It reminded me every other day that not only was the Alfred, the brother, that I loved and held so dear gone and replaced. It reminded me that I was part of the reason it could not come back.

Only people like Mr. Kirkland could bring out that lack-luster shine in my brother's eyes. And only people like Mr. Kirkland would be capable of stomping it out of existence entirely.

It was too big of a risk.

* * *

_This story is actually getting longer than I originally intended. We'll see how it goes from here, but - and again, I wish to stress this point - there is no excuse for child abuse, rape of any kind, or really any of the other vices in this story. Also, I would like to say that there is _no_ 'stereotypical' reaction to rape. A major problem in society today is that people, for whatever reason, have this 'stereotypical post-rape' victim image in their mind that is only encouraged by the media. Every psyche, every _person _reacts differently, and it is a CRIME in my eyes that so many rape victims go unheard not simply due to a lack of reporting or fear, but because people do not believe that they are 'acting like a rape victim.'_

_/rant  
_

_Please Review  
~Right_


	12. Chapter Eleven: Still Thankful

_Thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_ and _**Dead-Knight-of-Darkness **_for your wonderful reviews._

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, England, Hungary, Prussia, Austria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Russia, Switzerland, Germany, Germania, France, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide  
**Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Eleven: Still Thankful

The silence between us had never led to more conversations.

I was watching over my brother quietly and carefully. I felt like at any moment he could come tumbling forward. Crashing and burning. But I also felt like I was going to be there because, for the first time, I really understood what reaching the bottom was.

And I also knew what it was like to never, ever wish that on someone you loved.

But things are never that simple. My brother both rejected my attention and clung to it desperately. He didn't know what he wanted. Which was fine.

I didn't know either.

Still, as we would sit and work huddled around our desk in the corner of the dorm room, we sat in silence. But we talked through our eyes and how we would flinch each time Toris or Eduard opened or closed the door. Or how we went no where without checking with the other first.

* * *

Thanksgiving was not nearly as celebrated in Mr. Kirkland's English class.

In fact, he ignored it almost entirely. He claimed the festivity was all too much pomp and circumstance and that if we asked for Thanksgiving related assignments or stories in History or English again he would assign three chapters of homework.

Then he glanced to Alfred.

Alfred never said anything to Mr. Kirkland once class started anymore. Instead he crumpled up another picture of a cow and shoved it in his pants pocket, oblivious to Mr. Kirkland's gaze and also oblivious to mine.

It had been almost two weeks and, sometimes, I could see my brother physically cracking.

* * *

In Reading, Miss Hedervary seemed completely unfazed by the loss of one of her numerous crushes.

The delightful feeling of butterflies was all but gone in my stomach for her or anyone else it seemed. Everything felt cold and mean, even the phantom touches of her hands as she would lean over my shoulder to check on my work and ask questions about our favorite part of the story so far.

I kept praying that Gilbert would start knocking frantically on the door like he always did.

He could barge in, claim he was at the end of his days and sway weakly until he 'accidentally' fell against Miss Hedervary's chest. Then, in his ever proven honor, he would request that, before his last days, the beautiful Reading and Art teacher would accept his offer of wedded union.

But he had not stopped by in weeks.

There was a rumor that his father had finally stepped in and said enough was enough. Another rumor said he found Miss Hedervary exchanging kisses with Mr. Edelstein in the faculty lobby.

I wasn't sure which one would be more devastating. I _did _think to myself, however, that neither of those seemed like enough reason to stop Gilbert.

The boy had broke down the Art Room's door before to get in before lunch.

He fixed it, making it even better than it had been before, but the hilarious image was still engrained in everyone's minds.

When Miss Hedervary had moved away from us, I looked over to Al. Once he was sure that our teacher was not looking our way anymore, he folded his arms over his literature book and hid his face in the nook created.

I felt a tug at my heart and reached over to place a reassuring hand on his shoulder which, for whatever reason, ended up being a gentle back rub.

He never flinched away from my touch, not even the days directly after he was raped. It was as if he couldn't anymore, his muscles were too stiff and sore from being tensed at all hours, even in his sleep. In some ways I could find evidence for how he was handling so much better than myself.

But I knew I was looking past obvious pain in order to do so.

When I heard the familiar scratching of chalk on chalkboard, I turned in my seat to look at whatever new assignment Miss Hedervary was writing out for us.

_What are you thankful for? Write a 200 word Theme over the break._

I scowled at this.

How the hell were we supposed to answer _that? _There was nothing for us to be thankful for.

I seriously contemplated writing just that …

* * *

Eduard packed up his things for the week break. He then looked us over cautiously.

I smiled slightly to him. Words failed me once again.

There was no way I could thank him enough for simply staying in the room with my brother and me after Toris had moved halls. There was no way to thank him for being a friend to us when we had little to no one we could trust anymore.

And I couldn't help but feel like I _would _be able to thank him if I could honestly appreciate all those traits as much as I could spell them out.

I knew I should have been more grateful for him than I was.

"The offer still stands," he said genuinely toward both Alfred, laying on his top bunk staring at the ceiling, and me. "Mom and Dad wouldn't mind at all for me to bring some friends over for the week. I brought Toris and Raivis last year."

"Sorry," Al hissed from the top bunk. "Our names don't rhyme."

Eduard looked hurt so I swooped in to save the situation.

"We're still a little upset about not being able to go home to our grandma for the week, Eduard," I explained hurriedly. It wasn't entirely untrue. "I don't think we really feel like going anywhere else if we can't make it to her."

He said he understood and we parted for the week.

* * *

I tapped my pencil against notebook. The hall was quiet for only being eight at night.

Alfred was cussing at his math, occasionally wadding up the entire page and throwing it in the trash bin with stunning accuracy.

"You realize," he breathed, "without the rich boy, there's no reason for them to not come in _here. _Especially with Vash gone for the week."

Stopping, I gave him a look but said nothing. He returned my gaze but, like all the times before, it was hollow. He was looking through me.

"Stop bringing it up," I snapped, at last working up the nerve.

"I hope they come."

"Alfred!"

"I have a pocket knife now," he informed me, producing said item from his back pocket. I gaped at it and then glared at him. "Don't look at me like I'm a Hell's Kitchen thief. One of the older boys at the farm gave it to me when I was working in the hayloft and the rest of you were on feeding duty."

I faintly recalled it and turned my head to the side. "Who?"

"The creepy Russki," he spat, before smirking at the blade. "He gave it to me to help me cut through the bales quicker. I tried to give it back to him, but he said it wasn't his. Creeper. He's crazy is what it is. Communism does that to people. Anyway, it's mine now. And I hope those guards have the balls to try to come in here."

When it became obvious that I had lost my brother to one of his fits of insanity, flipping the pocket knife open and closed over and over and over and over and over, I turned and looked back to my notebook.

_This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for_

My pencil went to work.

_This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for pocket knives._

I crumpled up the page and threw it into the waste basket. It went in.

* * *

When neither of us could go to sleep, we sat our chairs side by side, ten feet from the waste basket which had been pulled away from the wall.

We ripped up two whole note books for paper wads.

Even after we began to joke around and shove each other during the other's attempt to shoot, our goals far out numbered the missed wads decorating the floor.

After Alfred fell asleep on the floor, I shoved my chair against the door knob and then went to the desk.

Pulling out the spare notebook I had, I began to write.

_This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for waste baskets and paper wads. The way they can be thrown away or picked up later reminds me of the way problems used to go away. I used to get my mom or my dad or even my brother to pick them up, crunch them into almost nothing, and then toss it far away from me where I thought I would never see them again. I am thankful that at least paper is still like that. I am thankful we did not get any paper cuts._

It wadded up nicely and made it in the bin with one shot.

* * *

Thursday morning had come too soon.

The two of us had yet to leave the room for anything other than the restroom, quick two-hour shifts at the farm, or eating. Sometimes we even decided against those things in favor of doing something together in the room like Tic Tac Toe, waste paper basketball, or table top football.

Sometimes we just sat there and I pretended to write down my thoughts while Alfred drew cows with a longing expression. I wasn't sure why he still drew them, it was obvious they no longer gave him the same satisfaction that they once had.

It was also the first time in a long time we could afford to sleep late into the day without consequence.

But then Thursday morning came and with it a knocking on our door at nine o'clock.

Alfred, whose head was tucked somewhere near my feet, kicked at my shoulder as he rolled over.

I laid there and stared at the bottom of the top bunk, hoping the knocking would eventually stop. It didn't, though. I was going to have to answer it.

One look to my brother, whose American flag underwear was stuck up in the air, told me that I would have no back up when I did so.

Moaning and running my fingers through my hair, I finally forced my limbs into motion and got over to the door. I stupidly opened it without checking the peep hole first.

Fortunately, it was only Gilbert.

"Are you lazy bastards still sleeping?" he asked, crossing his arms and looking particularly miffed. He did not wait for an answer, though, as he waved his hand and looked me over. "You've been here this entire week and you've not once come over to tell me? Say 'hey, Gilly, want to hang out and buy our shit again?'"

I frowned at this and truly did feel slightly ashamed. No one had been as helpful to us as he had.

"Well, whatever," he sighed before spinning me around and pushing me back into the room. "Get dressed. Wake up your brother. And get back down to the kitchen for Thanksgiving dinner. It's at one, 'kay? Get a move on!"

Then he shut the door.

* * *

"I'm not going," Alfred said when I woke him up and explained.

"It's the least we could do," I said. "The school is throwing it for the faculty and remaining students."

He scowled. "You say that like we owe them something. We're just here because we have nowhere else to go."

It was true, but we _did _owe Gilbert if no one else.

So, even though it burned my throat to say it, I retorted with, "Mr. Kirkland will be there, I bet."

He never responded to it, but he did start getting ready to leave the room.

* * *

There was an agreement we never said out loud to each other but it was still considered a promise. We were never to leave each other's sights.

As twins, it was not a new thing for us to go everywhere together, to participate in near identical events, but it hadn't been as common in the months before the attacks.

Until that point we had been gradually developing into our own people, still just as similar as twins could be but with a sense of individualism. It was refreshing and well accepted. We were _different people._

After the night in the bomb shelter, Alfred and I were conjoined once more. We were reborn, not as people but as something that dimly walked the line between dreams and instinct.

The only time it felt safe to be myself again was alone with my brother. And it hurt that the sentiment was not returned in full.

He was himself when we were in the room playing waste paper basketball, but his shoulders never slacked. He was guarded, _wishing _for an attack, an excuse to lash out. He was going to protect me no matter what happened, like I was some damsel in distress.

The only time Alfred was like his wide-eyed, innocent self again was in the presence of Mr. Kirkland. He dropped all defenses around the man.

So, when I was looking up from the carved turkey in the buffet line and saw my brother head straight for the only table that had only one person sitting at it, I was not surprised.

Mr. Kirkland looked at my brother, said something scathing with sarcasm and then nodded to the chair next to him.

I resigned to my fate of sitting at my brother's left hand and concentrated on the food.

* * *

Fate is funny that way. I never did make it to Mr. Kirkland's table.

As I prodded the cranberry jello with a mess spoon, someone seized me by the shoulders and squeezed me close to their chest.

The immediate response was to become completely and utterly rigid, unsure of who it was, but it did not last long. All my worries deflated when I realized it was only Gilbert, who was excited and feeling rather triumphant as he squeezed me to death.

"I knew you were going to come, Matthew!" he said with a laugh. "And Vati says that everyone ignores me! Ha! Proved him wrong!"

I gave a muted smile and looked over to notice Gilbert's family, all stone faced, pale, and blonde, were sitting with some man who seemed very effeminate and loud. While I had seen Ludwig, Mr. Beilschmidt, and occasionally even Mrs. Beilschmidt, the livelier blonde was completely new to me.

He seemed like family, even if he lacked the uncanny likeness of the Beilschmidts, so I could not help but wonder if perhaps this was where Gilbert got his unruly and somewhat obnoxious character.

"Where's your brother?"

I looked at him and then over to Mr. Kirkland's table. Gilbert's gaze followed and then he theatrically shuttered.

"Damn, I don't get that," he muttered to himself.

It took a lot for me to not voice just how much I agreed with that sentiment.

"Well, how about I spare you from an awkward dinner with the limey?" Gilbert questioned with a knowing raise of his eyebrows. "There's an extra seat next to me, Ludwig won't sit beside me today."

"I find that hard to believe," I said with a sigh. In his own way, Ludwig worshiped his brother that much was apparent.

"You would, Mr. Siamese Twin," the albino scoffed before waving his hand to the family's table in an over exaggerated gesture. "Fine, you can sit next to Francis then, I'll sit by the brat. Maybe you'll get your ass pinched instead of me."

So I looked at the mysterious blonde and then nodded.

* * *

Francis, as it turned out, was indeed a distant cousin. His mother had died recently and left him with quite the inheritance.

And name.

I gawked when we had first exchanged introductions.

"Francis _Bonnefoy?" _I asked with a flip of my gut. "The dorm I live in was named after you!"

He gave a quick, lofty smile and cocked his head to the side. "Oui, though it was my mother's investment at the time."

"Alf—Matthew Jones," Mr. Beilschmidt corrected himself quickly after his eldest son's warning look, "Francis currently stands as the largest benefactor to the school outside of the church itself. Naming a dorm after him, I'm afraid, is the least of the rewards he should receive from our institution."

I stared blankly at the science teacher. It was the most I had heard him say about anything that didn't involve dead frogs or the atom.

"Mon cher, I do hope that you did not invite me to this lovely Thanksgiving dinner simply to flatter me into investing more into the school," he said with a smile.

As Mr. Beilschmidt worked frantically to excuse himself from his poor wording, I looked over Francis. He was not an exceedingly young man, but he was not as old as his distant cousins. I couldn't help but think that he might have been around the same age as Mr. Kirkland.

Which brought me to turn and look for how my brother was faring.

He seemed fine, even enjoying his company and food, but he continuously looked over his shoulder until he realized that I was looking to. He then smiled at me, apparently feeling secure that I was with Gilbert.

* * *

Gilbert and Mr. Beilschmidt were fighting soon enough over theories or other things that no one else at the table cared about except maybe Ludwig. But Ludwig had disappeared into his mother's arms as she carried him to the bathroom with her.

I was left in the awkward situation of sitting next to someone I knew nothing about outside of the fact that he had more money than I could ever dream of having.

Francis was looking at me which made me squirm.

"Do you know French?" he asked lazily.

This brought me to stare at him. "No."

"Oh, but it is a most _magnificent _language. Have you ever wanted to see the Eiffel Tower?"

My cheeks suddenly felt very hot and I looked away nervously. "Um. What part of New York is it at?"

The young man balked and straightened up, rubbing the stubble of his chin. "What do they teach you children in this school? No French? No _culture?_ It is absolutely horrendous! And I invest so much into the school as well."

I was not sure where this was going but I felt like I had said or done something wrong.

"Matthew, I have this most important request," he said before looking at me with his blue-blue eyes. "Would you be willing to get paid to be my eyes and ears?"

This made me stare.

"I would ask Gilbert, but he would lie through his teeth to get money," Francis sighed. He then smiled at me almost fondly. "You seem like such a sweet, innocent boy, though. You wouldn't lie to me in your reports, non?"

I stared at him and then shook my head. "N-no, I wouldn't lie."

"Very good, I will need an excuse to come visit you often then," he said with a nimble hand patting my shoulder. "I shall be your private French teacher. I will meet with you once a week and you can tell me what happens in this school. If I make such an investment into _l'école_ then I should be able to keep up with all the matters at hand. Perhaps together we can make this school for the better."

Then my mind began to work again.

"Yes," I said, accepting the hand extended to me.

* * *

Alfred hugged me when we got back to the room. He seemed oddly chipper.

"Do you know what Mr. Kirkland said to me?" he asked with a glimmer in his eyes.

"No," I said, exasperated from the day, the turkey, and the new power I had been handed.

He beamed and put upon his best superhero pose. "'If you are going through hell, keep going.'"

I stared at him and sighed. "Sound advice," I reasoned before settling down at the desk. "I met Mr. Bonnefoy—the rich guy the dorm is named after."

"Is that who that was?"

"Yeah," I said before pulling out the worn out notebook. "He's going to be teaching me French. And paying me for it."

"It's a sucky language if you have to pay people to learn it," he yawned before heading over to my bed.

My smile did not fall, though, as I began to write.

_This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for opportunity. I am thankful that it presents itself when everyone feels like there are no more options left. I like how it can sneak up on you and, if you are daring enough to leap on it, send you soaring. _

_I am thankful that no matter what happens, there is one person for me to turn to and make me smile. Without these things, life would be a lot harder. And I could not take that._

Satisfied, I put the paper away and shoved my brother's feet off my pillow so I could get some rest.

* * *

Miss Hedervary, whose scarf was beautiful but did not completely cover the purple circle on her neck, handed our papers back.

Alfred had written his the night before it was due. It was about cows and fireworks and having a brother who was just as awesome as he was. He got a B.

It was the first time he had surpassed me in grades.

_D- _

_Not 200 words._

_Do you want to talk to me about this after class?_

_-Miss H_

It was nice of her, but no.

I had said everything I needed to say in those 82 words.

* * *

_It's picking up now and Francis is officially in the fold of characters so, there's that. I'm sorry, these updates may get progressively slower as I work on other projects for this account. So, be sure to check out the joint works as well as Left's soon to be released individual stories! Oh, and eventually our profile page will link you to our art tumblrs and LiveJournal. So, yay!_

_The quote Mr. Kirkland gave to Al is from Winston Churchill.  
_

Please Review  
_~Right_


	13. Chapter Twelve: When the Cows Call Home

_Thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_, _**Semetastic**_,__ and _**ForgottenReveries **_for your wonderful reviews._

_To address several questions I've been getting throughout this fanfic, there is no "main pairing." The story's about two brothers having to overcome child abuse and how best to take their revenge, if at all. We're officially at the point of the story that the latter aspect will be increasingly more relevant, though. So, sorry it's taking so long but we're getting there. It is OFFICIALLY taking twice as long as I thought it would _ Still, as far as pairings are concerned, make your own judgements on how much deeper the relationships go because I'm trying my best to stay clear of that subject for this story. (We'll see how well that pans out).  
_

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, England, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Denmark, Poland, Lithuania, Prussia, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide  
**Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Twelve: When the Cows Come Home

The first time my brother went to Mr. Kirkland's house for tea, I tagged along.

I felt like I was jerked around by a chain, my neck unwillingly snapping in every direction to mirror Alfred's movements. He gazed around the small apartment, to each trinket and map with wide eyed wonder.

As we were ushered further into the home, Mr. Kirkland began to grow a more pressing look. He seemed to be looking through us, like he was searching for the souls he professed to not believe in.

It made me uneasy. Alfred would not have noticed if Mr. Kirkland had written it on his forehead.

"I apologize for how small the living room is, boys," he said briskly as we walked into the tiny room.

I held my tongue because I didn't think he needed to know it was the largest apartment either of us had seen. After all, Al had become our mouthpiece.

"The only thing wrong with this apartment is that there's no cows."

* * *

Arthur was both very different from and the complete same as Mr. Kirkland.

As the hours of that Saturday after Thanksgiving ticked by, I became a little bit more accepting and a little bit more restless.

I was willing to believe Arthur Kirkland had no ulterior motives in his kindness, but I was not as enveloped in his company as my twin.

Still, I appreciated that in spite of my intuition, Mr. Kirkland didn't interrogate us. Our conversations were actually rather vanilla.

"Do you want a biscuit?" he offered.

"Ew."

"No thank you, Mr. Kirkland," I translated for Alfred.

Mr. Kirkland nodded in understanding and took one from the tin for himself. Alfred gagged slightly at this.

"That's a cookie!"

"It most certainly is not! This is a biscuit," Mr. Kirkland defended.

I watched my brother vehemently argue with our equally stubborn teacher and felt something unfamiliar crawl across my face. I reached up and traced the curves of my own mouth to follow its movements and pieced together what it was.

It was a nice, warming feeling to realize I wore and unprovoked smile. There was no forced laughter egging it on, no pleading puppy dog eyes of friends or even brothers. It was there and it was _happy. _

By the time I looked up to see Mr. Kirkland and my brother continue their argument, I realized that they wore it too. And something felt warm in my fingers and toes, a waking sensation after so long of never realizing how numb they had been.

* * *

It was late when we left that night and the nostalgia of a family setting had worn off. I was the third wheel again.

Al rushed out ahead of me into the hall of the teachers' apartments which was no surprise. It would be up to me to thank Mr. Kirkland for the evening.

"Matthew," I heard from far off behind me.

I turned to see Mr. Kirkland just then exiting his living room, a small, well worn book in his hands.

"You like reading, don't you?" he asked. "You've always read the next chapter in our books before we start on them in class."

I blushed slightly and twisted my fingers together. "Eh, well…"

When he shoved the small book rather harshly into my hands, I was taken aback. I looked at him curiously.

"It's a favorite of mine," he said with a smile. "I read it when I was your age. If you don't mind, read it and tell me what you think."

I agreed.

* * *

We were back in the dorm room before I got the courage to look at the book's cover.

It was called _The Count of Monte Cristo._

* * *

When we reached our bedroom that night and closed the door, I realized that past the overflowing waste basket and unmade bunks, the room felt warm and inviting.

Over the course of that week we had made the room in Bonnefoy Hall our own, something shared only between the two of us. It did not run as deep as our blood or our wounds did and it did not draw us into our own world like the horrific secrets we kept. But it was ours.

Alfred might have been thinking something similar as he lazily picked up his covers from the floor and stood in silent mourning for a few moments.

If twin telepathy was at all true, I would have known for certain that he was also thinking about how this could very well have been the last night we would have where the room would only belong to us. Eduard was returning on Sunday and the room would once more be somewhere cold and foreign we used to sleep in.

"It's going to be noisy tomorrow," I said to break the silence.

He nodded. I put _The Count of Monte Cristo _safely on the corner of my desk.

"Probably cold," he said with a distant look directed at the window. "The cows'll be cold. I hope someone remembered to open the barn. It might snow again."

I sighed and began to rummage through my drawers in pursuit of a good pair of pajama bottoms to wear. By the time I had done so and dressed in them, Al was still staring at the window. I grabbed a pair for him and tossed them at his head.

"Cows can live in snow," I said in a vain attempt to put his nerves to rest.

He gave me a pouting look.

"They can live in lava, too, but doesn't mean we let them," he attempted to argue.

I pretended to give his ludicrous statement thought before shooting back, "I have to say you're wrong on that one, dear brother." He wasn't convinced, so I poked a little more. "You're going to be the worst farmer ever, you know that?"

He _did_ get upset at that one.

"I'm going to be a cop!" he reminded me.

Not surprised in the least but still a bit curious, I made my way to the bottom of our bunks. "Then why do you worry so much about cows?"

Alfred changed into his pajama pants and hesitated only for a moment to answer my question.

"Because no one thinks they have to look out for them."

* * *

Never the fan of feet, I shoved Alfred's off my pillow again.

I did feel bad afterwards because I didn't mean to stir him, but it was a necessary step to take.

"Do you always have to do that?" he asked in that grumpy tone he always used when he was woke up.

"Your stinky feet need to stay off my pillow," I replied defensively before closing my eyes. "And why do you have to sleep on my bunk anyway?"

There was silence for a few moments and I thought that perhaps Alfred fell asleep.

Then I heard, "It helps with the nightmares."

When I finally drew breath again, it stung my chest something fierce. Alfred must have heard it because he turned toward the wall.

"Night, Mattie."

I didn't respond. My mind was still reeling. It was the first time I had realized that it helped with my nightmares, too.

* * *

In the fresh snow that had fallen that morning, we made snow angels.

We had never dared to make them back at Hell's Kitchen. It was too girly, the snow was too dirty, and, again, we really didn't feel like getting our asses kicked over it.

After service that morning, though, the crowds of returning students was merely a trickle. Nothing to be concerned about.

When we finished we laid there in the snow. I remember watching the clouds as snowflakes danced around, landing and melting on my nose.

Alfred stuck his tongue out long enough to lay over his lip and down his chin.

"You're going to swallow yourself with a mouth that big," I teased.

He responded in what I was sure was a snide remark but it was lost considering his determination to keep his tongue stretched out for maximum surface area.

Finding it in me to end the moment, I sat up and looked at him. "You're shaking like a leaf."

"It's freaking cold."

"Wimp," I sighed, ignoring his whine. "We can go inside if you're that cold."

_"No!" _he cried out like he would to our mother so many years ago when she tried to drag him away from the block's arcade. Sitting up rapidly, he looked like I had tried to run over him. "We have to go see the cows first!"

I muttered under my steamy breath how childish he was but consented nonetheless. We made our way to the farm.

* * *

I always half expected for my brother's adoration for the farm and cows to run out.

There was no question that he enjoyed the rural settings. We were city boys at heart, but Alfred had always had trouble being on time with the New York minute.

Still, I would have been lying if I had said I didn't enjoy the unbridled happiness on my brother's face as we stood on the rotting fence board, looking out onto a crystalline pasture. Steamy air blew about through the falling snow from the heat of the herd's bodies.

I leaned in, balancing my chin on my folded arms. "They all look good to me, Al."

His teeth were chattering so loud I thought someone had lit fire crackers. "I bet they're cold."

"How do you know?"

"Because_ I'm _cold," he snapped.

Tapping my finger on my lips a few times, I considered this. "You don't have fur," I reminded him. "Or are a cow."

I knew I had 'won' because Alfred went into a quiet pout and looked over the pasture like a shepherd counting sheep.

Farms were nice but my attention easily shifted to some movement near the barn.

Just outside the door, bundled enough to almost hide her well endowed frame, Miss Braginskaya carried a pitch fork toward the loaded horse cart the way many women would carry a basket of bread. Her smile, though lined with consistent nervousness, was broader than I had ever seen it.

Coming up behind her was the pale, tall upper classman we had ran into after the fall festivities. In his arms he carried some large sacks of salt and feed. On his back was a tiny Lamar Hall girl, in school uniform, clinging to him like a Howler Monkey.

They seemed happy, chattering in a language that seemed to tumble carelessly from their lips.

"Should we see if they need help?" I asked out loud before looking back to my brother.

He had already jumped down and was heading back to Bonnefoy. I ran to catch up.

* * *

"When he gave me the knife, he told me people bleed faster if you cut around here," Alfred told me darkly within our room. He gestured slowly to his jugular. "I knew he was talking about the guards."

"Or was crazy!" I asked critically. I gripped his shoulders tightly. "You can't do anything stupid, Al. You can't. _Please."_

He looked at me coldly through stormy, half-lidded eyes.

"I am going to kill them. They deserve it. It's not stupid."

We argued until Alfred's demeanor had changed. He took a nap and I wondered what I was living with.

* * *

When Eduard came back that night, I helped him unpack and he complimented the disaster area we had made the room.

After he had settled, I picked up _The Count of Monte Cristo._

* * *

When school started back up that first week of December, everything seemed to be curiously normal.

No one needed extra time to acclimate to the school after Thanksgiving except for us. But I don't think we would have been ready to go back if we had years.

There was a difference between walking the halls when they were quiet and vacant and when there were so many people you could not distinguish one face in the crowd from the other. It seemed like the more people that there were the more we would shrink back.

But we still had each other. And that was a bond we could trust much more than any of our friendships, I thought.

It was Mikkel who first pointed it out during a lunch break.

Alfred and I got our food from the line and immediately sat, one beside the other, on the first table we found. We didn't even look up to the rustling of people scooting down the table to join us. It was our usual gaggle of friends who, apparently, could not figure out that the two of us were on high alert.

"You two have been acting funny for weeks," Mikkel pointed out as he dug his nails into his own sloppy joe. "You don't talk to anyone but each other. It's weird."

The table suddenly erupted in consensus. I simply stared, realizing the queerness of my own behavior for the first time.

Alfred just scowled.

"We don't have anything to talk about," he said before chomping into the remains of his sandwich like a bear trap. There was a darkness in his eyes that sent chills down my spine, and it wasn't even directed at me.

I began to wonder if we had taken our silence too far.

"Like, friends totally don't keep secrets," Feliks piped up, his lazy gaze wandering over to Toris who was quiet and looking almost understanding.

Again, I remained quiet. I was not cruel enough to say what I was thinking.

Fortunately, my brother was.

"We never asked for friends," Al said lowly.

Our friends stared at us in absolute shock. We finished our sandwiches and began our period of isolation.

* * *

"Do you want to talk about it?"

I had asked my brother that question through looks and gentle embraces so often that I didn't think I had to say it out loud.

By the end of that week, he had left me no choice.

"No," he responded before slumping into the corner of the room and just sitting on the floor. He looked utterly drained.

"I think you need to talk about it," I said with slightly more resolve.

For my troubles I got the shock of a chair being kicked at me.

"GOD DAMN IT!" he screamed. "JUST LET ME FORGET!"

There was silence in the room again which eventually gave in to the sounds of my brother crying when I hugged him. He gripped onto me for dear life.

"I want to kill them, Mattie! Oh, God, I want to kill them!"

After waiting a few minutes, I pointed out the obvious. "You have to either forget or kill them. You can't do both."

Fickle as always he pushed away enough to look me in the eyes, like I needed to see how red and swollen his were. "I can do both. I just have to figure out how."

That was when I began to really worry.

* * *

Our friends hadn't talked to us since Alfred's explosion which, frightfully enough, didn't seem to faze us. The only exception to this was Eduard, and his was more out of necessity than anything else.

As time went on, I began to think indifferently about whether or not Eduard was trying to move out of the room. Whether or not that would do Alfred some good.

Alfred himself was so rampantly swinging between his moods it was hard to keep my own head on straight. It didn't help that everyone was noticing.

Mr. Kirkland had us over for tea three times that week. He still asked us nothing.

That was both comforting and a waste of time.

By the time I would hit the pillow each night I was aching with tiredness. Not that it helped because I could not even close my eyes.

Eduard was back in the room and Alfred and I had a silent agreement not to share bunks when he was there. We needed more rumors about the Hell's Kitchen Boys like we needed holes in our heads. But ever since Alfred had pointed out that sleeping together made the nightmares go away, they had gotten worse.

In my dreams it was me by my lonesome in a laundry room. It smelled like starch and my entire body was swallowed by gobby, sack like flesh that moved around me and inside me. I would melt into nothing, blinded in unforgiving pain and the laughter of my mind's demons.

I never dreamed about my second rape. I didn't even think much of it. It was easy not to.

When I thought about the second rape, I thought back to my brother.

It was a sickening feeling that hit me like a freight train when I realized I was using my twin as a means of escape for my own terror. But it didn't stop me.

* * *

We were rightfully surprised when Gilbert grabbed our arms after classes one day and began to drag us toward the street to town.

"I waste so much fucking money on you two," he hissed as he pulled us along.

Had it been two weeks earlier I would have pointed out that we should have signed out first. No one really cared about the rules anymore, though.

* * *

We stared at Gilbert from the other side of the diner booth and he stared back, his red eyes narrowed angrily.

"You two have been assholes to everyone for a week, it's time to stop it," he snapped. "The only professional asshole at this school is me and I'm not looking for any apprentices so tell me what's going on."

I looked to Alfred. My heart nearly stopped when I saw that long lost flicker back in his eyes.

He suddenly seemed alive and earnest again.

But that meant he was going to tell.

Suddenly I was torn.

Alfred looked at me and apparently saw something in my face that made him reconsider. His gaze dropped down to his hands.

"Nothing," he muttered.

"Whatever," Gilbert snapped, obviously dissatisfied. "Just cut it out. And I'm talking mostly to you, Alfred Jones. No one's heard Mattie talk since me and Francis talked to him on Thanksgiving."

I blinked owlishly. Really? Had it been that long since I talked to someone besides Alfred.

It didn't help my case that I just sucked on the straw of my milkshake and pretended to not exist.

* * *

_If it EVER takes me this long again to write a single chapter for _Trigger_, I will go ahead and apologize. I just needed a break and it kind of never ended until my literal college spring break ended. So ... yeah. I'm sorry.  
_

Please Review  
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	14. Chapter Thirteen: The Demons

_Thank you, _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_, __for your review._

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, England, Estonia, Prussia, Germany, Italy, Ukraine, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide  
**Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Thirteen: The Demons

In the time I was not silently biding in classes or tagging onto Alfred's coat tails, I read the words of Alexandre Dumas with absolute fervor.

The few times I talked it was to Mr. Kirkland about the book. We mostly responded to each other in half-paraphrased quotes.

"I'm going to be learning French," I said one afternoon as Alfred finished up his math tutoring down the hall.

Mr. Kirkland looked at me like I had shot him in the heart.

"What the blazes for?"

I could not say the truth, as that had a chance of ruining everything all at once. Instead I said it was because it was the original language of the book. Mr. Kirkland didn't buy it for an instant but he allowed the conversation to continue in that direction.

* * *

After a silent dinner between only my brother and myself, we returned to our dorm room. Eduard was still out so that meant that we could talk out loud rather than in our usual muted stares.

"I've been thinking a lot about what Gilbert said to us," Alfred informed me as we began our evening routines.

I unpacked the _Count_ from my bag of books first and thumbed the well worn pages. "Oh?"

"He was right," my brother admitted, his hands weaving through his growing locks. I estimated it wouldn't be long before he demanded we get haircuts again. "He was right, about you not talking to anyone but me. And you really don't talk that much with me. It's just me most of the time. And you nod."

Perhaps in subconscious sarcasm, I nodded absentmindedly to the rather astute observation.

Alfred scowled.

"It's not funny," he snapped before flicking a paper wad my way. I dodged, to his chagrin.

"You're not really much of one to talk," I reminded him. "You might talk to people, but you treat them like shit. You don't _want_ to talk to people, but you do. Because you don't know how not to."

He stared at me, his jaw quivering slightly and I immediately wanted nothing more than to punch myself in the gut. Alfred's emotional states flipped flopped so much that I could forget that as soon as he became Mr. Perfect he could shift anywhere between Mr. Batshit Crazy to Mr. Sensitive at the drop of a hat.

There was also the fact that I had become increasingly well adjusted to being able to stab at his greatest insecurities with deadly accuracy.

"Sorry," I apologized with much more of a long suffering draw to it as opposed to the sincerity I felt. "What were you going to suggest we do about it?"

As easy to turn as a light switch, Alfred dried up and rubbed at his cheeks. "W-we should make it-it up to Gilbert first. Tomorrow," he managed past his hiccups.

After some consideration, I nodded in agreement. Then, remembering our talk, responded with, "Okay."

* * *

We did the math or, rather, I did the math.

With all the extra hours we had put in with the single hope of avoiding awkward situations with our former friends, we had put together nearly thirty dollars.

It was carefully hidden in a sock which was tucked within its mate which was stuffed at the very bottom of my underwear drawer.

When we got it out it was wrinkled and curled into a tiny, balled fist. We had to take each bill out separately and determine which ones we were going to use.

Twenty dollars was put back under sock-and-key.

"That'll be enough to buy Grandma Jonesie something real good," I assured my brother.

He never protested but his emotions, as always, were on his sleeves.

* * *

After the final classes that day, we made our way cautiously across the snowy grounds. It didn't take us long to figure out where Gilbert was because there were usually two signs for when he was around: crowds of teenage boys and explosions.

On that chilly December afternoon, we had both.

We found Gilbert laying flat on his back, five feet away from the crowd who had been watching his trial of the newest potato rifle. There were still his boots in the snow close to the barn that had a hole in it now thanks to the spud projectile.

We hurried to his side while the older kids laughed and looked over our friend and mentor.

He blinked curiously at us.

"I put too much dry ice in it," he said in the sage-like tone that was supposed to make his blunder come off as a cautionary tale.

Alfred laughed. I bit my lip.

"So what do you two want?" he asked before groaning and pushing himself up into a sitting position. He marveled at his own handiwork even as Miss Braginskaya came running out, screaming in utter horror at the mess made of her barn door.

The other older boys split.

"To eat at the diner," Al informed him.

He gave us a careful look over.

"What, now you just expect it?"

I shook my head, but Al answered.

"No, we have money," Alfred explained, though his voice was thinning with impatience. I figured it was because he was getting cold. "We want to pay for you."

He looked at us and then laughed before walking over to get his boots.

* * *

After Gilbert assured Miss Braginskaya that we would eventually come back and fix the barn door, we made our way into town.

The entire time I was wondering how Al and I got roped into fixing the door he broke. Meanwhile, the town was busy looking flabbergasted at the arsenal packed over Al's shoulder.

Gilbert rubbed tenderly at his ribcage.

"Are you alright?" I asked when it became apparent that Alfred was too absorbed with the pipe gun to notice the older boy's pain.

"Probably just internal hemorrhaging," he joked.

It fortunately had gone over my head or I would have been distraught.

"Hey," Al suddenly spoke up, looking away from the dangerous weapon. "Why wasn't Ludwig with you? Don't you two build these together or something?"

"Yeah, well, good thing he wasn't with me today," Gil snorted. "He likes to hide behind my legs when I shoot. I would have taken his scrawny ass out. Nah. He was playing with the new friends he made in the preschool. Lucky son of a bitch. Mary, forgive me for insulting mein Mama."

"Whoa," Al grinned ear to ear. "Ludwig got friends!"

"Well, at least one," Gilbert explained with a roll of his eyes. "And Vati is making sure he's on best behavior around him, too. Seeing as how it's Headmaster Vargas' grandson. Ludwig can sure pick 'em. Stupid kid."

He paused in thought before looking at the two of us carefully.

"But at least he's making friends, right?"

I frowned, Alfred mirroring me.

* * *

We were at the diner as long as usual but said less.

It was mostly Gilbert explaining how he was going to take out a whole wall of the barn with his next invention. Alfred found this inspiring and I found that it went much too far over my head.

We seemed to stay there for hours, enjoying the meal and small freedom from St. Francis deSales.

When we got ready to leave, Alfred and I went to the cash register to pay for the bill.

She informed us that Gilbert, who was out the door already, had paid.

* * *

In the time that followed, we begun to spend more and more of our free time hanging out with Gilbert Beilschmidt.

I couldn't imagine how much that got on his nerves, but he never said anything about it. Rather, he rather enjoyed having the two of there to help clean up his messes, help him repair doors, and hold up his experiments while he messed with them.

One afternoon, out early from classes just so we could try to fix the hinges of the barn for Miss Braginskaya, Gilbert smashed his thumb in the door.

He emphatically swore and looked over the bruising nail. With his marble skin the wound already looked as though it was rotting off his hand.

Finished cursing, he tipped his sunglasses down his nose and stared at the two of us as we did our best not to laugh.

"You moved the door!" he accused Alfred.

"Maybe you'd see better if you didn't wear sunglasses when it isn't even that sunny," Al suggested.

Gilbert snorted at this and sat down on a bale of hay to nurse his wound. "It's not as if I _like_ wearing these stupid things, Brat! It hurts my eyes if I'm out too much without them."

My brother and I made faces. Or the same face, actually.

"The sun?" he asked.

"Reflecting off this damn snow, yes," Gilbert hissed. He then looked at the door with a bit of a menacing look. "I've had enough of you."

I began to put up the tools knowingly. Alfred wasn't one to work without it being fun and it was clear to see in Gilbert's demeanor that he had called it quits for the day.

"Want to eat?" Al asked hopefully.

"You always want to eat," the albino retorted before rubbing his chin. "I gotta pick up Ludwig anyway. Stupid preschool. Why does it not last as long as regular school? Then Mama or Vati could get the brat."

We looked at each other as Gilbert got up and dusted off his pants.

"Can we come with you?" Al asked hopefully. "Mr. Kirkland's not off work until three. And we don't have work shifts until after dinner."

"Eh," Gilbert grumbled, which we had learned meant yes. He then headed out of the barn with the two of us at his heels. "You two are like puppies. Holy shit. I will eventually stop feeding you."

* * *

Preschool was merely a room in Lamar Hall filled with paintings on the walls of cuddly bugs and the alphabet. For whatever reason that particular alphabet went "Q-S-R-T."

It was the first thing that Al pointed out when we opened the door and it made the attending nun blush.

Gilbert laughed. I felt just as humiliated as the nun.

Mr. Vargas' grandson was a mop of brown curls and hanging off of an exasperated Ludwig's arms like he was a set of monkey bars. I had never seen Gilbert's brother look more frazzled or outgoing.

That seemed to be enough to satisfy Gilbert.

"You ready to go, brat?" our friend asked affectionately.

Ludwig nodded. Little Vargas shook his head hysterically.

"Ve!" he called out and hugged Ludwig tighter until the kind nun came over to separate them.

We left with Ludwig walking between Gilbert and myself. When his brother offered a hand, he refused it and took mine.

I felt nervous and sweaty at the surprise of it, but didn't let go. Ludwig just looked angrily at his brother while Gilbert laughed.

"Should've said no then."

* * *

Our plans for the rest of the day were fairly normal by our standards.

Alfred and I were going to walk back to the employee apartments with Gilbert and Ludwig and leave them to visit with Mr. Kirkland. It'd be a nice time to have tea and be questioned about where I was at in _The Count of Monte Cristo_ before we took a work shift at the farm.

That was probably when we would do our best to ask Miss Braginskaya's forgiveness for doing everything that day except fixing the barn door.

Unfortunately, we didn't see those plans through as we didn't even make it around the corner of the corridor in Lamar with our friends until I had to stop short to keep from running into someone.

Al, ever the least observant person, ran headlong into their waist.

He rubbed his face and began to look up saying, "M'sorr—"

Then he joined me in just staring at the head guard.

* * *

I had several moments in my life where time seemed to still and not even my heart seemed to work. Everything in the world, especially me, seemed to shut off.

That moment where Alfred and I were face to face again with the head security guard was always one that stood out.

There were two reasons I couldn't react. One was that for the first time in almost a month we were facing our rapist again. The second was that I knew that Alfred was carrying a knife on him.

So I watched my brother with absolutely no ability to think. I felt like a camera, just taking in the images of the world as they came flying at me.

Alfred made no movement toward his pockets. He didn't move at all.

"That's alright, son," Tweed said with a crooked grin before cupping my brother's chin with a massive hand. Then, in feign affection, he patted Al's cheek and walked past him. Whistling.

I bolted toward the waste basket and left it with my lunch.

When I was able to shakily make my way back to the others, Alfred was crumpled up on the floor, balling into his hands. Little Ludwig was gently tugging at my brother's shirt.

Gilbert glared at me when I came back.

"You're telling me what the fuck is going on," he informed me.

For a moment I considered this. Then I said no.

* * *

Gilbert tried to argue with us, tried to get angry. But he couldn't possibly have understood.

No one could, I decided. Just the two of us.

Eventually the Beilschmidt boys left us be only because I pointed out the fact that the best thing for Alfred at that moment was for me to get him back to our room.

It wasn't really an easy task. Alfred was inconsolable, a downright mess. He couldn't even hold his sobbings long enough to stand on his own.

I resorted to half carrying him back to Bonnefoy, his arm around my neck and his face buried into my shoulder. Must have been quite the scene because absolutely everyone was looking at us on the way there.

He collapsed on my bed as soon as his knees hit the frame. I rushed out with one of our wash cloths, wetted it, and came back.

Grandma Jonesie had set a wet wash cloth on my face after our mother's funeral and I hoped that it would work for my brother. I gently laid it over his face and he sniffed and sobbed beneath it but eventually quieted.

I then locked the door and shoved a chair beneath the knob. Eduard be damned, until I got my brother back to his senses the room was ours and only ours again.

* * *

Mr. Kirkland had taught me that it was easier to understand complicated books like _The Count of Monte Cristo_ if you had a pencil with you.

Sometimes I would underline words I didn't know or sentences I thought were beautiful. Occasionally I would draw stars next to passages that Mr. Kirkland had already highlighted, as if to say I agreed with him in our own code.

Most of the time, though, I would draw smiley faces or frowning faces at the beginnings and ends of chapters. I think that said more about the book itself than any of the other silly things I would do to deface the French classic.

When I sat next to Al on my bed, still hours after our encounter, every chapter I read received a frown.

Al was staring at the bottom of his bed and sniffing from time to time, real quick like it was supposed to hide the fact that it ever happened.

His eyes were red and swollen, as was his nose.

But it was alright. Mine were too.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

I paused from reading and looked at him incredulously. "What for?"

"I promised to kill them," he muttered miserably. "I don't' think I can."

Taking his hand, I gave him a gentle squeeze.

"That's alright," was all I could think to say. I don't know why I didn't tell him I already had a plan.

* * *

I continued reading, holding my brother's hand as he finally fell asleep. It made flipping pages more interesting.

We ignored Eduard knocking on the door and then telling whoever was with him that someone had blocked it. After all, he had a key, the knob just wouldn't turn.

It was only a matter of time before Vash came bashing on our door so I decided to come to a stopping point in the book.

Then I read the line that changed everything.

_"Oh, God," said Monte Cristo, "your vengeance may sometimes be slow in coming, but I think then it is all the more complete."_

I thought about it for a moment and then conceded, putting two stars by the line.

"Yes," I agreed. "Yes it is."

Then I marked on my mental calendar. The next day would be my first French Lesson. It was also my first step.

* * *

_Going to the Keeneland to put some money on a pony. Wish me luck!__  
_

Please Review  
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	15. Chapter Fourteen: The First Step

_Special thanks to _**XxFuyukaina-BakaxX**_, _**lilredd3394**_, and _**Axxi **_for the wonderful reviews._

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, England, France, Hungary, Prussia, Estonia, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide  
**Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Fourteen: The First Step

Alfred never talked to me about feelings. As condescending as it might sound, I think the idea of it was somewhat over his head.

He, like our father before him, was a man of action. Crime deserved punishment and the world needed police officers to ensure the cycle remained in tact.

During this time, no father really told his sons how to work out their feelings. And Al was never close enough to our mother to get that sort of assurance from her that I did.

He never really even heard that he was loved from Dad or, at least, I know neither of us heard it out loud.

We only had Grandma Jonesie, who had not written to us in a month and a half, and each other as far as families were concerned.

Around three o'clock on the day after our encounter, Alfred crawled into my bed and slept curled up in my blankets for every moment we were not in class.

I began to reflect on this more and more.

On that day I sat next to his silently sleeping form and gently ran my fingers through his hair, _The Count_ folded over my knee rather than in my hand for once. He didn't stir, though his closed eye lids twitched uncomfortably.

The more I thought about it the more I realized we never said we loved each other either.

I wondered if hearing it out loud would be that important to Al.

* * *

In the classes we had attended, Alfred looked miserable, puffy eyed, and ready to fall over asleep at any moment.

The mouthpiece of our duo was not talking and I did not feel like taking his place. Instead we sat in utter silence, ignoring the curious eyes on us.

Still, it got Mr. Kirkland's attention.

So much so that around four in the afternoon, I heard a knock on our door. I wasn't sure who it was until I opened the door.

Then I was just surprised.

"Your brother seemed under the weather," Mr. Kirkland explained awkwardly. "And, er, I couldn't help but notice neither of you stopped by for a spot of tea yesterday."

It was interesting to hear an English teacher babble. But I was far too interested in the opportunity Mr. Kirkland had brought me to reflect on it for too long.

"Alfred hasn't been feeling well since yesterday," I explained gently. "I don't really know what to do for him. I was going to have a French lesson today."

Mr. Kirkland looked genuinely concerned and shifted his gaze to the lump my brother had become on my bed.

"Would it be too much to ask if you would take him for the afternoon?" I continued, getting Mr. Kirkland's attention again. "He always feels better when he has tea and biscuits with you, Mr. Kirkland."

"He does?"

I forced a faint smile. "Yeah. He trusts you," I said honestly, though I could feel a bit of negativity building up in my chest at the truth of it.

"Alright then," the teacher said with a nod. "I'll take him in until you're back from," he swallowed painfully, _"French."_

That was all I needed.

* * *

Alfred woke up easily enough and seemed better just by seeing Mr. Kirkland there, full of concern and gentleness.

He changed and I explained to him that I would be going to French lessons while he and Mr. Kirkland were having some tea.

Then, when Mr. Kirkland left the room to get a pot started at his apartment, I turned to my brother seriously.

"If you want to tell Mr. Kirkland anything," I said, "you have my blessings."

He stared at me for a moment.

Then he got red in the face.

"Only us," he repeated from that terrible night.

I suddenly felt my confidence in the plan drop. Maybe Alfred honestly didn't want to tell.

* * *

What M. Bonnefoy arranged for our French lessons was a tiny room across the hall from Miss Héderváry's art room.

From what I could tell, it had once been the prayer room for the nuns but had become something of a janitorial locker over time. No one seemed to care when M. Bonnefoy procured it for mysterious tutoring sessions with the delinquent from Hell's Kitchen.

Then again, considering his importance to the school, I think he could have gotten away with murder at St. Francis deSales.

Considering what else was over looked there, it wasn't too shocking of a thought.

Not for me.

* * *

I caught myself with such morbid thoughts from time to time. I had grown a sort of fascination with them.

The world was much darker for me, and without my brother's hand steadfastly in my own I felt like I didn't owe anyone much of anything. Certainly not my loyalty. Certainly not my life.

So I entered the room with as much skepticism as my young mind could afford.

I did not trust Francis Bonnefoy, even if he was distantly related to Gilbert Beilschmidt. I didn't even truly consider Arthur Kirkland to be in my good graces yet.

What Francis was when I entered that room was a stepping block, a tool to begin righting every wrong done to my brother and myself since we entered the school.

Then, as I saw him leaning back in a chair with an intent look on his face at the décor, I felt something different.

It hadn't hit me until I saw him there with nimble fingers on a book and his legs crossed.

He looked just like the pictures in my mother's photo album, the pictures of a young girl and her brother with a mop of hippy's unkempt hair.

* * *

Francis smiled at me as I took my seat across from him. "Mathieu, it has been a while since we last met."

I stared at him.

"Are you related to any Williams?" I asked hopefully.

He blinked at me. "Not that I am aware, _mon petit._ Why?"

The longing for kinship buried itself within my chest again. I tangled my fingers. "Nevermind."

My answer wasn't enough for the Frenchman as he tapped impatiently on his lips and stared at me with dulled eyes. I had felt such a gaze before.

He was attempting to read me, or at least understand some things on my mind. But I was very closed off by this point. I thought he surely should have noticed it even at the Thanksgiving dinner where we had met.

I wasn't ready to let him that far in.

Not yet.

There was a plan, and for my brother's sake I was going to follow it.

* * *

"What do you want to ask me about the school?" I asked.

Part of the plan was to get this pattern started soon. I had to let Francis Bonnefoy believe in full that I was a plethora of information and gossip on the going-ons of St. Francis deSales. He had to know that everything I said was earnest. And then he had to learn what a dark and evil place the school was beneath the floors of Bonnefoy Hall.

"What do you want to know about French?" he asked in return.

I crinkled my nose. This wasn't part of the deal.

"Know about French?" I decided to humor him.

"Oui. _La langue de la France, _Mathieu," he said with a toss of the hair on his shoulder.

"You say my name weird," I said quickly. Then I wondered if I was perhaps channeling my brother's energy as a defense mechanism.

Bonnefoy raised a brow at this and I wondered if he realized that catching me off guard like this was causing me to internally panic.

"It is French, oui?" he questioned as he stroked his chin's stubble.

I blanked. I had no idea. If it was I seriously doubted that my parents would have picked it for that reason let alone known about it.

"You must learn some French while you are in my care, mon cher," M. Bonnefoy explained. "It will make this all the more believable to your peers. Don't want you to be pointed out as a tattle tale."

That was when I grew some respect for Francis Bonnefoy. He had no idea what even that little assurance meant for me.

* * *

_"Monsieur Bonnefoy."_

"Monsieur Bonnefoy."

_"Mon nom est Mathieu."_

"Mon nom is-t Matthew."

_"Je parle un peu français."_

"Je parle an poo francis."

_"Mon frère Alfred."_

When I didn't repeat, Francis looked over to me with his thin eyebrows reaching for his hairlines. He was so over dramatic.

"Something the matter, Mathieu?"

I stared at him, perhaps a bit harsher than I should have.

"Don't bring my brother into this," I warned.

He blinked lazily. "Why, Mathieu, all I said was 'my brother Alfred.'"

"He doesn't like French," I said finally. It wasn't a complete lie but it made Francis' eyes spin.

"Poor boy doesn't know what he's missing," Francis sighed. "Let's continue."

* * *

_"Je vous remercie. Bonne journée."_

"Je vu remercie. Bon journey."

Francis looked to his watch and stood up. "That was 'Thank you. Good day.' We're finished for now, Mathieu. Thank you for being such a good student."

I spluttered. "B-but, Mis—_Monsieur_ Bonnefoy! You didn't ask me anything about the school or what's going on!" I protested, pretending to not hear my own panic and desperation.

"No," he agreed and began to put on the coat that had hung loosely on the back of his chair for the past hour. "That is what tomorrow is for, oui? I hope you will practice even without me around."

I stared at him. He was messing up everything.

Francis smiled and looked at me curiously. "You have been doing very well with this introduction to French. Have you learned some before?"

My cheeks felt warmed suddenly. I looked down to my hands. "I've been reading _The Count of Monte Cristo. _There's lots of French words in it."

"What a dark book for a little boy," Francis said aghast. "Whatever had you start reading it?"

"My English teacher, Mr. Kirkland," I explained. "He asked me to read it. I'm glad he did. I really like the Count."

Francis looked at me with an analytical air to him. "You mean _Dantès_, you are sympathetic to him?"

"Maybe," was all I could reason before adding, "but the Count has a plan."

He absorbed this information and bid me _adieu. _I promised to meet him the next day.

* * *

By the time I got to Mr. Kirkland's apartment, my brother had sobered up some from his quiet suffering.

He even gave me a halfway decent smile when I walked into the living room.

For a few moments I wondered if he had finally confessed to Mr. Kirkland what had happened to us, but the tight pinching together of the older man's eyebrows told me he was frazzled and confused still.

"I see you're feeling better," I managed dryly.

Alfred handed me a biscuit. "I've been eating Arthur's cookies."

"Biscuits."

My brother gave Mr. Kirkland a pouting look. "Don't start with me."

Arthur stuttered at that, unsure if Alfred was joking or insulting or both, before looking at me. "Well, Mr. Jones. It appears your brother has made a rather miraculous recovery. Hopefully you can keep him in such good health until the end of this short semester?"

I nodded. "I'll do my best, Mr. Kirkland."

* * *

When we got back to our room, we found that Eduard's half of the living quarters was utterly empty save for a piece of paper. It was laying on the desk and scribbled in nice, ballpoint ink.

_Sorry._

_Mikkel and Tino were looking for a new roommate. _

_Assumed you wanted some more space._

_Eduard _

Alfred was incapable of absorbing it, but I couldn't help but feel slightly abandoned.

I liked Eduard. He was a good roommate.

Instantly I was filled with regret for never telling him as much.

It certainly wasn't his fault that we had to close ourselves off for our own psyches.

* * *

Alfred had a nightmare that night and crawled in bed with me.

He curled up like a kitten and I rubbed his back until he was lost in sleep again.

Then I closed my eyes and waited until dawn woke me up. It gave me a few hours to think things through and read some more before Alfred woke up.

* * *

"I think this is a bad idea," he said.

He carried no emotion in his voice so the statement came off as a blatant fact. Truth was, I already knew that he thought it was a bad idea. He had told me a few times already. The problem was, I didn't care.

"We'll come back and work," I assured Alfred. "I'm just tired of you moping around."

My hand immediately flung up and met the skin between my eyes because I could not believe that I made a third jab at him already that morning. I hadn't said much him beside all that either so it was as if every time I opened my mouth it was to degrade him.

Fortunately, Alfred didn't start to reel back from me that time or to get angry. He merely looked at me with awe, as if impressed.

That, more than anything, was a sign that he was beginning to level out again.

"Isn't it weird that you're the one that doesn't want to go to classes now?" he asked, a little nostalgic.

I swallowed, remembering what we were like before. "Yeah. It is."

He didn't protest as we left, even if we didn't sign out. He acted like it wasn't even breaking the rules.

* * *

We waited patiently, digging the heels of our boots into the plush carpet as the lady went to the back.

I looked to my unusually quiet brother and smiled some.

"Mr. Kirkland's really good to you," I said as sincerely as possible. He looked up. Nodded. "What does he do that gets you out of your slumps?"

Alfred paused and thought for a moment before smiling almost fondly. "He acts a lot like Dad used to," he explained with a soft touch to his voice. "He tells stories like they're real, even when they're silly. He likes stuff that happened in the past better than right now. And as mean and nasty as he talks sometimes, he never means it. He respects people that look him in the eye."

I frowned. "Dad had lots wrong with him."

There was a moment of silence and Alfred shook his head at me. "Dad did the right things when he knew what they were," he said somberly. "I think … I think Dad was just doing what he thought was the right thing."

The tension between us was growing so thick I could almost reach out and grab it.

"You're wrong," I said in a near panic. "He didn't think about us, Al. Not really. If he did he would've never left us. It's not the heroic thing to do!"

His eyes seemed to finally focus again and he looked at me a little surprised.

I grabbed his hand. "What are we here for?"

"Grandma Jonesie," he uttered under a tiny breath.

"Because she loves us," I reminded him. And, a little reluctantly, "and because I love you, too, Al. You're my brother no matter what. Don't leave me. Don't go because of them. They don't deserve that."

He laid his forehead on my shoulder and sucked in a deep breath.

I accepted the ring as it came out. We spent every dime we had made.

* * *

The ring was nothing special. If anything it was a lack luster.

It was a single carat emerald, her favorite color.

We held its box like it was the greatest thing in the world because, to us, it was.

* * *

Al was visibly better. There was a certain confidence back in him and I couldn't help but feel relieved at it.

The moment we made it back to our room, he made his way to my desk and took out my notebook.

Curiously, I looked over his shoulder and read the first bit he scribbled down.

_Dear Grandma Jonesie,_

_Me and Mattie love you so much! We miss you. Are we still coming home for Christmas?_

I smiled and made my way over to the bed where my book was waiting. I planned on reading some before meeting with M. Bonnefoy.

* * *

Francis rubbed his hairy chin like it was something of great interest.

"So, Mathieu, what is so urgent that you were desperate to tell me about it yesterday?" he asked smoothly.

My heart jumped. I felt like joining it in rushing into the presented opportunity, but I held back. This had to be done right.

"It's nothing," I said quietly.

"Oh, but of course it was _something," _he pressed. "You must feel free to share everything with me. You are my eyes and ears."

My cheeks twitched at the attempts to keep my smile from forming.

"It's just the guards," I said very quietly. "They make my brother and me uncomfortable."

He looked at me incredulously. "How so?"

"They like to come in the bathrooms when we're showering," I said, then quickly added, "But it's not very often. And now that I say it out loud it sounds like they're just doing their jobs. So it was silly. Anyway, guards protect people. I don't know what I was thinking."

Francis looked honestly disturbed by the information, as he should've been, but nodded in agreement.

My heart fluttered. My first victory: I'd planted the seeds of doubt.

* * *

[Notes]

*A lot of people are seeming to take this story as twincest, so I'll once again state my position that this is not their relationship at all. They're brothers, twins, who have suffered great losses at a young age. They just can't imagine turning to anyone else (few exceptions in the rest of the main cast). Of course, people can take from the story what they want. I'm just saying my position being... the author and what not.  
*"M. Bonnefoy." No, I'm not making repeated grammar errors ... in this instance. "M." is just the abbreviation for "Monsieur."  
*"La langue de la France." French. "The language of France."  
*"Mon nom est Mathieu." French. "My name is Mathieu."  
*"Je parle un peu français." French. "I speak a little French."  
*"Mon frère Alfred." French. "My brother Alfred." (covered in the chapter, but figured I should cover my bases)  
*"Je vous remercie. Bonne journée." French. "Thank you. Good day."  
*Dantès and the Count of Monte Cristo: especially for those who haven't read the book, Dantès is the Count before the Count was improperly imprisoned. He is a sympathetic character but once he becomes the Count of Monte Cristo it becomes strikingly apparent that sympathies aside, he has become a monster. He is motivated only by revenge and he will use and abuse anyone and everyone in order to exact his vengance.  
*The emerald ring: emeralds symbolize many things but, for this story, the most important thing is hope.

_I've done my best to keep these chapters note-less because one, they're taxing to do, especially when they're not absolutely necessary like they are with the other works on this account (was that a shameless plug? More than likely.) and also because I don't want them to distract from the character arcs. Which have been fairly terrible up until this point. When I originally decided on doing this story I wanted it to be done in about 14 chapters. As you can see, that not only didn't happen but I'm not completely sure that this is the halfway point anymore. _

_I'm not entirely sure what to blame this on. I've not ADDED to the plot. If anything, I've actually subtracted many side stories as I've come along. I simply talk too much, I think. And I apologize. I try to edit each chapter before I post it and do remove scenes I find unnecessary but it's getting to the point that I'm having difficulty finding anything I want to trim. As per usual, I'll blame my partner in crime, Left, who is my biggest enabler. If you have suggestions/concerns, please tell me so~  
_

Please Review  
_~Right_


	16. Chapter Fifteen: Semester Closing

_Special thanks to _**CBJC**_, _**Starry Mind**_, _**XxFuyukaina BakaxX**_ and _**AmmyMoth **_for the wonderful reviews._

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, England, France, Hungary, Prussia, Estonia, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide  
**Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Fifteen: Semester Closing

On campus the lack of bullying had been all but overlooked. Too many students were more focused on the prospect that the semester was ending and Christmas was around the bend.

The Nuns of Lamar Hall got an idea of putting a huge, twenty foot tree at the center of the grounds. It took them three days from start to finish, but they decorated every branch.

And who else was there to help them reach the top for the star but Gilbert Beilschmidt?

Alfred and I enjoyed the view from the steps of Bonnefoy.

Once again, it became one of those things we never talked about but we were both thinking back to what had once been home.

It was fun, sitting in the snow, to imagine that warm glow from sitting too close to the baking oven. We could smell the gingerbread in the air and that tingling pride that only came from decorating the two foot tree that sat in the middle of the coffee table every year.

There was that joy of Christmas morning arriving and knowing that in the living room was a stack of presents for us.

And Mom would smile and rub the crust from our eyes. Dad would drink his eighth coffee, staying awake long enough after his shift to watch his boys open their gifts.

I would dutifully attend mass. Alfred would almost wiggle his way out of going.

Then the whole family would go to Grandma Jonesie's and we would get two dollars each which would be saved up until we wanted something big.

The memories we shared were so vivid.

I knew what Al was talking about when he turned to me on the steps of Bonnefoy and said, "I miss it."

So I said, "Me too."

* * *

The first time I had any inclination that Mr. Kirkland was in trouble was when Al and I were walking to his apartment and we saw Mr. Vargas standing in the doorway.

The headmaster had grown grayer since he charmed us into attending St. Francis de Sales. He was still as tall and broad shouldered as ever, however, so I recognized him instantly. The closer we got, the thicker Mr. Kirkland's voice got with the man.

"I don't particularly care for how the administration runs things on this campus," Mr. Kirkland said. "But I refuse to allow them the pleasure of approving each of my lesson plans."

"It won't effect this semester," Mr. Vargas said tiredly.

Alfred and I stopped and listened to that familiar, sarcastic snort.

"Oh, yes. Only the semester after it. And the semester after it," he seethed. "Soon you'll tell me the archbishop would prefer I recite Psalms instead of Shakespeare in my literature class."

To that the headmaster bristled. "The word is literature as well."

"Not if it's spoon fed and deciphered for them," Mr. Kirkland defended. "If you want them to grow up and be the next saints, fine, but they'll never appreciate what is in their damn books if it means nothing to them personally."

I could then see his hand raise, holding a worn out copy of _The Canterbury Tales_ that was then shook in front of Mr. Vargas' face.

"I teach them to make sense of this," he said sourly, "then they can read your word of God and tell _you _what it means."

After a few moments of climactic silence, the larger man sighed and turned our way. He never so much as acknowledged us before taking off toward the exit.

Then we entered and had tea like usual.

* * *

"I like going to mass a lot more now than I used to," Al said, his lips hardly leaving the tea cup close to his face. "But Mattie likes it less."

Mr. Kirkland seemed distant. His chin rested on his hand as he gazed out at the falling snow.

After twenty minutes of silence, I couldn't take my brother's oblivious approach any longer.

"Are you in trouble, Mr. Kirkland?" I asked.

He waited for a while before turning and looking at me.

"How is the Count?"

It was aggravating as hell, and yet I genuinely responded "good."

* * *

When the last nail settled in the hard grain wood, I felt like something else had settled as well.

Gilbert backed away and grinned cheekily at the door, like he was mocking it. Then he looked at us expectantly. So we clapped.

Then Alfred returned his hands to frantically rubbing his shoulders. "W-w-we done n-now?" he asked over the chattering of his own teeth.

Our friend crossed his arms and looked down his nose at Alfred before sniffing at the air. "What, seriously? You're cold? This is the warmest it's been all month! Matt, you cold?"

I shook my head and gathered the loose nails on the floor of the barn. When Gilbert's glare caught my eye I sighed and looked him in the face. "No," I gave him his much desired verbal answer.

"Mattie never gets cold, so that's not a good question," my twin debated before starting to bounce on his heels. "Come on, Gil! Let's just tell Miss Brag-in-sa about the door and let's go!"

Seeing an opening to at least feign normalcy for my friend, I walked over to my brother and nudged his trembling shoulder. "I thought you'd want to go look at the cows and tell them you fixed their barn, Al."

He blinked a few times, as if surprised I had made contact at all before snorting. "This isn't their barn, Mattie. Their barn's on the third pasture. It doesn't even have a door. Duh."

That got him a flick from Gilbert. "No fighting. If anyone's fighting anyone it's me kicking your guys' asses. Understood?"

We looked at each other, then to Gilbert. "No."

Both of us got knocked upside the head.

* * *

Watching my brother's arms flail as he and Gilbert exaggerated every tiny detail about our 'hardships' in repairing the broken barn door got old fairly quick. Miss Braginskaya, however, was fully involved with the retelling.

She sat nearly on the edge of her well-chipped kitchen chair as she petted her sleeping baby sister's hair. The youngest of the immigrant family gripped aggressively to Miss Braginskaya's shirt even in the deepest of sleep. And the little girl seemed to scowl even more each time Gilbert or Alfred shifted a pitch.

I could sympathize.

As I inched closer to the door, I seemed to pay more attention to my two companions only in hopes they would start to break off their conversation with the… well endowed farm manager.

So I didn't notice the large, burly brother of the two girls until he held out a steaming cup for me. I blinked at him and waited a moment until his name returned to my memory.

Ivan.

"This is thank you for fixing my sister's barn door," he said in thick, broken English. The deepness of his voice didn't match the smile that rested below the curve of his big nose and I found myself remembering every negative word my father ever had to say about Russians.

Remembering then that those words came from my father, I took the cup just to spite him.

"You're Jones' brother," he said like it was just a mundane observation. And perhaps it was. A menacing one.

"You're the one who gave him a knife," I replied shortly.

He smiled before glancing over to Alfred and Gilbert. My blood felt hot in my veins as I came to the conclusion his eyes were more set on Alfred than on Gilbert.

"You two have been through a lot," he said as, once again, a simple observation. "I thought a knife would help you from going through more."

"I don't know what you're talking about," I responded, my gut twisting up inside me.

He looked at me through the corner of his eye and smiled pleasantly once more. "Neither do I."

I opened my mouth to try another retort when Al turned around. "Mattie! Let's go see Mr. Kirkl—come on! Not _you!"_

Ivan and Alfred then had a little spat which made Miss Braginskaya nervous and woke the she-demon up. I, as usual, faded out of the fight as if I hadn't been there at all, only to notice that Gilbert was staring me down.

He apparently saw something between Ivan and me he didn't like and rushed Al and myself out of there before the little girl, Natalia, tackled Al in defense of her brother.

* * *

The walk to the faculty apartments was hastened. Al and I watched nervously as the wheels visibly turned in our friend's head.

"I haven't seen you look like that since we ran into that creep Tweed, Matt," Gilbert said finally as we neared the steps of the apartments. He then looked us both over. "You told that creep Ivan kid what's going on but not me? I thought I was your guys' friend."

My brother and I looked panicked to one another before looking back to the older kid.

"No! I wouldn't tell a Russian anything!" Al defended darkly. "And-and there's nothing to tell anyway."

I frowned but joined my brother with almost equal ferocity burning inside me.

Gilbert glared at us before heading up the stairs. "Yeah, well, he knows something that I don't. Maybe I'll just ask him."

That seemed to ease Al's concerns but certainly not mine.

I wondered how much Ivan knew.

I worried even more about how he might have known it.

* * *

Mr. Kirkland's biscuit tin hadn't been refilled since the last visit, much to Al's chagrin. I was rather happy that I didn't have to give a courtesy nibble on a brittle, half-burnt cookie.

When our teacher was putting away his teapot, Al turned to me on the couch and waved his hands at my face like he was starved for attention.

Made sense. Mr. Kirkland had been spending most of the time we were there asking me about the books I'd like to start after I finished _The Count of Monte Cristo._

"What?" I asked expectantly.

"Mind reading," he responded.

I blinked. "What?"

He smirked like he had just won the spelling bee. "You're trying to figure out how Ivan might tell Gil anything. It's obvious. He's a Russian spy. He was actually born in the lab somewhere in China or something and now he's in America."

"And can read minds?" I asked critically.

"Yes."

I threw the nearest throw pillow at him.

* * *

It was normal for most students to look excitedly at the mailboxes near Vash's room for letters from home.

As the semester came closer and closer to closing the mail boxes were more and more likely to be filled with treats and presents from various relatives.

Our room's box was consistently empty after Eduard moved rooms. Occasionally there was a small letter from Antonio, chiding us for not writing more often or for skipping services like he was so certain that we were doing.

He hadn't mentioned Grandma Jonesie for a long time, though. And we had not heard from her directly either.

Ever since Alfred had sent that letter to her, though, he had excitedly checked the box every day. The day we fixed the door finally was the first day he had forgot.

As he napped and I finished my book, I remembered that fact and decided to check on our box for him.

It wasn't empty.

Instead there was Alfred's letter returned with the bold red screaming DECEASED.

* * *

When Alfred woke up I handed him the clean envelope that was marked up with stamps and addressed like Grandma Jonesie always addressed our letters.

_Grandson Jones and Grandson Jones_

Inside was a wrinkled sheet of notepad paper that looked worn and stained. It was a short letter, written in dull ink marker but it told us Merry Christmas and sorry for not being able to write back for so long.

It also said that she loved him and missed him and to tell me the same.

He grinned from ear to ear and read it out loud to me like I hadn't heard it myself. A logical conclusion since it had been unopened when I handed it to him.

Then he sputtered at the part that proclaimed she was sorry but that we wouldn't be able to go home over the break.

"That's not fair," he said sourly, sniffing into the back of his hand so he wouldn't show his tears. "Doesn't she know we want to see her?"

I had no words. So I nodded.

* * *

That night I curled up on the top bunk with Al and told him I was having a nightmare.

He said he'd keep it away and went back to snoring within the same breath.

I tucked him under my chin like I had so many nights before when he had come to me for comfort and tried to figure out where to go from there.

That had not been part of the plan.

I had wanted to take St. Francis deSales down.

But that was when we still had somewhere else to go.

* * *

"Al," I spoke up as we tied our shoes and got ready to go to breakfast.

He looked at me, face happier than it had been in months. My stomach hardened under my skin.

"Yeah?"

I bit back on my tongue and thought of the best way to address the issue. I hadn't slept all night out of grief and guilt.

"What is it, Mattie?"

The letter was hanging on the wall, taped there over our desks, just like what Al used to do with the letters Grandma Jonesie had sent us before that.

"Okay, seriously. Cat got your tongue?"

"Merry Christmas."

"It's not Christmas yet, stupid."

I knew that. I just couldn't think of anything else on the spot.

* * *

We sat across from each other in silence for a while. M. Bonnefoy stroked at his stubble and looked at me expectantly.

I looked to my feet again. I hadn't felt like this in a while.

It was hard to tell if I should have been more happy that I wasn't an emotional husk after all.

"Bee in your bonnet?" M. Bonnefoy finally asked.

"I think my grandma's dead," I said lowly. When he was too shocked to reply, I continued. "The last letter we sent her came back and said 'deceased.' That's … that's what that means, right?"

I finally looked up and stared into his face. His jaw was slightly dropped and he was staring at me dumbfounded.

"When… when we last heard from her, she'd been kicked out of the apartment. So maybe she's just… out there somewhere. She doesn't have to be dead."

He steepled his fingers and leaned into them. I felt bad for the man, he hadn't been expecting this, I'm sure.

"It's possible," he finally said, rather weakly.

"Okay," I said. "I don't have to tell my brother then."

* * *

I knew I had M. Bonnefoy when we shook hands that evening and prepared to leave.

"If you ever need anything, Mathieu, I am here for you."

That was when I knew I could start telling him about the guards and the things that no one spoke about in St. Francis.

Maybe, just maybe, my brother and I would find somewhere to go from there.

* * *

_For everyone still reading after my unanticipated hiatus, I am so sorry. I know I promised that I wouldn't take so long again for an update, but I was just SLAMMED with projects and Final Exams at the end of this semester. I know, I know - college does that to you, but it was a new experience for me. Still, I apologize and I hope this update, now that things start happening, will be worth the wait.  
_

Please Review  
_~Right_


	17. Chapter Sixteen: Plans Change

_Okay, I would like to apologize for the time it took to write this chapter. I started before my vacation two months ago and finished the first third of the chapter then, but due to working quite literally every day since I returned from vacation, I did not have the time to dedicate to this chapter what it really needed. Rather than force it out, I waited until I could really get into the groove again. While I'm still not totally satisfied with this chapter (it was originally going to be much longer) I feel like it is enough to publish. So I'm sorry for the wait to all of you who have almost given up hope!_

_Special thanks to _**Axxi**_, _**Fuyukaina Baka**_, _**Butterfly Ichihara**_,_** l Shadow Bard l**_,_** Deikuru**_,_** .X7**_,_** Blind Squirrel**_ and _**MeltingMetal315 **_for their great reviews._

**Characters: **(Human Names Used - More May Be Added/Cameo In The Future) America, Canada, England, Prussia, Hungary, Poland, Switzerland, Ancient Rome, France, OC!Historical Figures, OC!Civilians_  
_**Rating: M  
Warnings: **Angst, Drugs, Substance Abuse, Religious Overtones, Child Abuse, Rape, Swearing, Violence, Mentions of Suicide  
**Disclaimer: **Hetalia: Axis Powers © Himaruya Hidekaz, this is a fan created story.

Chapter Sixteen: Plans Change

The day I handed back _The Count of Monte Cristo_, Mr. Kirkland gave me a bit of a proud smile and returned the old book to its place on the oak shelf.

It was a bit emptying. For the first time since I had gotten the book it was no longer within reach. It had become my bible in a Catholic school.

Afterwards, my brother and I headed to mass and I finally asked Alfred what he was looking forward to each time we went to chapel. He smirked and told me that God was going to get revenge for all his little children.

"Well," I said, "I don't know about that."

He would have to wait in line if that was true.

* * *

There was one week left before the Christmas break. There were no classes scheduled but there were allotted times for semester exams.

The exams for our elementary grades were not supposed to be hard but I noticed that the students who were not on scholarship were attempting to study.

I didn't even know how to study for regular tests, let alone a semester's worth. I wasn't really feeling like talking to anyone to figure out what to do either, though I was fairly sure Gilbert wouldn't have minded all that much in helping us out.

Alfred might've asked if it had occurred to him, but I wasn't going to bring it up with our sometimes mentor. Likewise, I don't think he was all that aware of what was going on.

Perhaps this would have bothered me more if my concerns had still been strictly academic, but they weren't. I didn't owe anything to St. Francis deSales.

* * *

"What are we going to do for Christmas?" Al asked. "Are we going to walk to the city?"

I kept our brisk pace up, which was admittedly quite a feat considering how Al would pause every couple of steps to scoop up some snow and hold it in his hands to see how long it lasted.

"We'd never make it," I replied simply. "That was a long drive."

"Well, we can take our time," Al continued. "It's not like we're coming back."

I blinked a few times and looked to him. He seemed utterly unfazed by his own words.

"I guess you're right," I said. "But what are we going to do?"

"Give Grandma Jonesie a ring," he said. "And use the left over money to buy a house. And a farm."

His words were dreamy and his gaze far off. He didn't believe his own words so I didn't shoot them down. There was nothing wrong with fantasizing.

* * *

Art was an interesting exception to the semester exam issue.

Miss Hedervary felt that it was a little less than necessary to evaluate her elementary students on the color wheel and so told us to draw one picture for her.

Then, as the students finished and made their way to her desk, they exchanged their paper for a homemade cupcake.

"I drew a cow," Al informed me as we walked up together. He then flashed the chocolate cow at me before hiding it against his chest again.

I… wasn't really surprised. But I let Al enjoy his moment in any case.

Miss Hedervary smiled at us, a bit of something uneasy in her eyes. The more I looked at it the more her smile seemed awfully forced.

"Oh, and what do you two have for me?" she asked with her normal tone.

"A cow," Al informed her shortly before slapping the picture on the desk and holding out his hand expectantly for a cupcake.

It was received.

Then she smiled at me and I faintly recalled a terrible portrait of her at the beginning of the school year. "What about you, Matthew?"

I turned over my sheet and frowned at the gray mass with white squares.

"Oh? What is this?" she asked as she took the paper into her hands.

"The city," I replied. "I don't need a cupcake, Miss Hedervary."

We went back to our seats and sat down.

* * *

If one were to judge by the day's events up until that point, Miss Hedervary would've given us a Christmas goodbye with all the conventions.

Gilbert was never a student that took conventions to heart, though.

In his one last true chance to do so, he tore into the room in the last fifteen or so minutes of the period and turned quickly to Miss Hedervary's table. He looked at her behind thick, black-rimmed sunglasses and held out a bouquet in a display that would've made Paul Newman jealous.

"I might not make it through the winter without you, Miss Hedervary," Gilbert announced in that lofty voice only he could manage.

The entire class laughed awkwardly and looked to our teacher. Those of us who knew Gilbert best, however, did take a moment to examine how he looked.

It might've been the first time I noticed that he had, in fact, lost some weight in the past week.

I only noticed due to the fact that he had disappeared to "study" and we hadn't seen him much over the week save for a casual wave when we crossed paths.

Miss Hedervary smiled thinly at him. "Shouldn't you be in a class right now? Taking an exam?" she asked him severely.

He laughed and shook his head. "You know better, Miss Hedervary! I'm a super test taker! Now… about marrying me…"

* * *

Alfred and I were still caught in the dangerous spot of not knowing where to go next.

The only concrete thought in Alfred's mind was that we were not staying at St. Francis.

I wasn't so sure anymore.

After all, I had yet to tell my brother that there was no where else to go.

* * *

We were leaving Miss Hedervary's class for the last time when we were stopped in the hall by Feliks.

"Hold on, Broskis," he said. "We have like a special announcement."

I inquired who "we" pertained to only for the door behind us to open again.

"Who else feeds you brats?" Gilbert soundly answered before wrapping the toothpicks he called arms around both our shoulders. "Feliks and I are arranging a Christmas smash for the gang before everyone heads out for the break. You two are going. No excuses."

Al looked at me, though I had no idea what for.

It wasn't like either of us had any say when Gil got like this.

* * *

When you're a kid it always seems like you have all the time in the world.

There's never a rush on much of anything.

Years later my brother once asked, quite eloquently I might add, "what the fuck" was I waiting on if I was going to blow the whistle anyway.

I'm still not sure.

I think maybe "time."

There was no way I could've known that "time" was actually running out.

* * *

The breaking of our door's lock wasn't actually what woke us up. Al said it was but he was wrong.

I know because he woke up the exact time as me. When the door was rammed into.

We had still been in the habit of shoving the chairs of our desks against the door but apparently it didn't work as well as it had in the movies.

The two of us were tangled up on the bottom bunk, pressing ourselves as much against the wall as possible. We were still dazed, still confused over what was going on and whether or not it was actually a dream.

I was hardly able to catch my breath when the two silhouetted guards neared us.

They were saying something as they came over but the only thing I could hear was their footsteps hearing us and Alfred's hitching breath.

My mind was blank and my body numb until I felt myself be jerked away from my sibling.

I told myself that if this happened again I would have to end everything because no single-minded pursuit or revenge could help me get past a third round of my body's abuse or a second round of watching it happen to my brother.

I closed my eyes as a hot mouth closed on my collar bone and languidly moved its way up.

Then Alfred snapped.

* * *

After Al's meltdown with Tweed I had all but forgotten the knife from Ivan Braginskaya.

Until Al plunged it through my assailant's hand.

Somewhere between the forceful kiss and the guard's scream against my lips I got the idea of biting his tongue until my mouth felt like it was filled with copper pennies.

Then Al grabbed my hand just before he was punched hard enough to rattle his brains. We went tumbling to the ground.

I took the moment that the second guard used to check on his fallen comrade to pull my brother to his feet and take off with him down the hall.

It only took a minute or so before we ran into Vash.

* * *

For as fast and frightening as the moment of calamity had been, our troubles seemed to both begin and end in the instant that we ran into our Hall Brother.

Vash must have heard the commotion and been on his way toward our room already when we bumped into him.

The instant I felt our frames collide with his and knew who it was, though, I took to clinging.

To feel someone, anyone, who was even partially in our circle of trust after almost reliving our personal Hells was more of a sanctuary than any forced service we had been made to sit through.

We hid ourselves in Vash even as he barked at us and demanded to know what was going on.

"What exactly is going on here!" he demanded from us yet again.

Then the two guards made their way, one bloodied and battered, from our room.

This was the beginning of our first battle of redirect.

* * *

Alfred had somehow managed to catch his breath since we grabbed onto Vash and was suddenly between me and the guards. Meanwhile, I was preoccupied with grabbing onto the back of his nightshirt with one hand and pulling down on Vash's sleeve with my other.

I stared straight into the eyes of our would-be attackers. And they stared straight back.

When I had seen them before, I had seen nothing but evil in them. When I saw how their eyes darted from us to Vash, I saw something else.

I saw their fear.

Vash must have saw something too, because the moment the guards began to talk, our Hall Brother's hands clasped our shoulders and he shook his head at their demands for him to hand us over.

"These boys are on my hall. If they were pulling pranks or causing mayhem, it is my business to deal with them. You should go back to making sure the grounds are safe for the students," he said lowly.

There was a certain amount of distrust in Vash's eyes.

Good.

The guards looked to each other, then back to us.

"We were attacked," the guard with a bleeding hand explained quickly. "As soon as we entered the room—"

Vash's eyes narrowed.

"Why were you in their room?"

* * *

The voyage from the hall to Vash's room was a blur.

At the end of it all, the only thing that mattered was that Vash had, in his own way, sided with us. And, somehow, as a boy no older than sixteen himself, he had frightened the guards enough to keep them from pursuing us further.

"Those guards are shiftless," Vash announced as he returned from assessing the damage to our room. "That was an expensive piece of school property, that door, and if the Headmaster expects me to report damage the students do, he can be sure I will tell him what these thugs are doing to our campus."

We sat, Al and I, huddled on the foot of Vash's bed. We met his aggravated speech with utter silence.

He looked at us seriously. "We will be meeting with Headmaster Vargas first thing in the morning. You'll tell him everything that happened tonight, no exceptions," he explained.

My brother looked at me, as unsure as I felt.

Vash caught this exchange and rubbed the bridge between his eyes, sighing lowly.

When he looked up, something about his glance seemed more genuine than we had expected. "Are you both alright?"

I didn't answer. Al did.

"No."

* * *

For "safe keeping" we slept on the unused bunk in Vash's room. It was the deepest rest either of us had had in a long time.

It was also the first night that we didn't need the moon to shine through a window to assure us it was still there.

And it was also the first time we didn't even mutter a good night to each other.

I felt secure that, whether by my design or not, the plan was taking off. There would be no way it could fail.

As usual I woke up before Alfred, my chin resting on his head while his arms curled around my waist.

When I woke, my eyes were met with Vash's, who was staring at us intently.

He was in his desk chair, facing the door to the hallway. I figured he hadn't moved once the entire night.

* * *

Headmaster Vargas was older every time we saw him. He was tired, his once proud smile seemed wrinkled and damaged. He seemed to be accutely aware of an anvil hanging just above his head.

I stared at him silently the entire time we were in his office that morning, Alfred seemed to look at anything but.

Vash also sat with us.

There were two extra seats for this report, they were never filled.

"This is bizarre," the Headmaster muttered as he looked to the clock on his shelf.

"It's a sign of men with something to hide," Vash hissed.

Alfred and I had yet to tell our story, we hadn't said a word.

There was a knock on the door and we turned to look, half anxious and half petrified.

M. Bonnefoy walked through the door. Tweed was behind him.

* * *

The atmosphere was thick enough to be cut with a knife and nothing more than formal introductions had been said.

Then it was silent.

Tweed was occupying one of the available chairs. M. Bonnefoy was standing in a far corner, out of my line of sight.

Headmaster Vargas looked wearily to my brother and I.

"Boys," he said lowly, "the two of you have caused quite a ruckus since I admitted you to our school."

I turned my eyes just slightly to look in Tweed's direction after I heard the strike of a match. He lit the cigarette between his fat lips.

"It's to be expected," he said lowly, "from boys from Hell's Kitchen."

I heard Al grit his teeth. Then I heard, "We're from Clinton."

* * *

Vash explained, in great detail, about his patrol the night before and about the strange behavior of the two guards who were not present. Headmaster Vargas listened with his fingers steepled before his face. Tweed puffed without any acknowledgement of my brother or myself.

"Where are these guards?" the headmaster inquired when Vash finished.

"Gone," Tweed answered. "I could not seem to find them. Their resignation papers were on my desk."

He nodded and then looked to the two of us. I suddenly felt Alfred's hand grip my own.

"The only side there is to hear then is from the two of you," the aging man explained as he looked at the two of us expectantly. "What happened last night?"

Alfred looked at me, desparation in his eyes and his cheeks paler than paper.

I suddenly understood why.

In that moment where the whistle could be blown, where I could get everything out right then, I realized I couldn't say a word.

Because Head Guard Tweed was sitting three feet away from us, smoking a cigarette and puffing his smoke.

And I had never been more afraid in my life.

* * *

When I couldn't answer, the opportunity quickly became lost. It was ceased instead by our mortal enemy.

"The boys obviously are frightened, Mr. Vargas," he said, snubbing out his cigarette in the ash tray on his employer's table. "The actions of the night guards are ineccusable but what can I do other than fire those that have already quit? We should get the janitor to fix the door before the night's end."

I looked to my shoes, Al's hand trembling in mine.

"I would like to hear from the Jones twins, Mr. Tweed," the headmaster said firmly before sighing. "Though you raise an excellent point."

"Of course," the slob chuckled. I felt a burning in my face and I just knew if I was to look up for even a moment I would be looking into his black eyes. "I do my best to be aware of the students, Sir. I know everything that's going on and I fix what needs to be fixed."

We were prodded by Vash and Mr. Vargas for at least another hour. Then they gave up.

M. Bonnefoy did not speak even once.

* * *

We, along with our Hall Brother, were excused so a conversation could continue between the adults present.

I felt only numb, even as we walked past M. Bonnefoy and he gave me a reassuring smile.

"I would like to keep the two of you somewhere safe until the door is fixed," Vash explained. "Is there anywhere you feel like you can go until I come back for you?"

There was hardly a hesitation.

"Mr. Kirkland's," both Al and I said at once.

Vash studied us for a moment, assessing whether or not we were serious. Then he nodded in agreement, but I already had an amendment.

The plan wasn't completely lost yet.

"Vash, could you take Al?" I asked, actually surprising both of my counterparts.

"M-Mattie, what about you?" Al asked, taking my hand again.

"I'm going to sit out here," I said, facing one of the waiting chairs. "I'm going to talk to Monsieur Bonnefoy when he comes out. He'll walk me over to Mr. Kirkland's."

It made sense. Enough to where they followed my request.

* * *

I took my seat politely.

Al and Vash had been gone maybe five minutes at the most when our would-be attackers entered the hall to Headmaster Vargas' office.

* * *

_An entire summer later, we're progressing forward again, at long last. I apologize to all my readers if this update was not quite up to your expectations. I hope you don't mind hearing, once again, that things will start to get better ^^;_

Please Review  
_~Right_


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